Mike Vranos

Who is Mike Vranos?

Michael W. "Mike" Vranos is an American hedge fund manager and philanthropist who in the 1990s was referred to by some as the "most powerful man on Wall Street." In 1993, he reportedly earned $15 million from trading mortgage bonds. Fortune Magazine once called him "one of the best bond traders on Wall Street." According to a 2007 Wall Street Journal article, he has continued to be regarded as "the best-known mortgage-bond trader on Wall Street."

Vranos headed collateralized mortgage obligation trading in the early 1990s at Kidder Peabody at a time when that firm dominated the marketplace. Seizing the opportunity created by a bear market, he left to start his own firm, Ellington Management Group, in late 1994. That same year, Kidder Peabody fell on troubled times and was sold to PaineWebber. In spite of being affected by fall-out from the Long-Term Capital Management debacle in 1998, as of April 2004, Ellington had delivered a composite annualized return of 15.4%, after fees. Ellington continues to market a variety of investment offerings.