Steve Cohen and Jawad Mian at Sohn 2025

So let's start with the present moment, Steve. This year has been defined by persistent tension. Are we in a recession or not? Is this a bull market or a bear market? How do you see it?

1. Growth Slows Without Recession

God, if you asked me that question a week ago, two weeks ago, I might have given you a slightly different answer. The whole thing with Trump and what happened with China was a little bit of a surprise to me. I didn't expect things to unfold the way they did, where China basically capitulated.

I look at it pretty simply as far as whether we're in a recession yet: we're not. I think we are going to have significantly slowing growth. We think it'll probably be, you know, like a 45% chance of recession, right? So that's not insignificant. Even if it's not technically a recession, it's definitely going to be slowing growth.

When you add up the tariffs, the 10% rate, the sectoral tariffs, and whatever happens with China, you're probably going to end up somewhere in the range—I thought it was going to be 16% to 20%, and now it's probably lower, perhaps a 14% to 17% rate. It's hard to know, hard to be exact, when things are jumping around like they are.

We think growth is going to slow, and we don't think the Fed's going to act right away because they're still going to be worried about inflation from tariffs. Next year, we think growth is going to be in the 1.5% range, maybe lower, which is okay but not phenomenal.

The question becomes: What kind of multiple do you put on these numbers? I would call it much slower growth, but the chance of recession has lessened given what's happened recently.

Is there anything about this moment that feels familiar when you look at the price action?

2. Markets Rally Back Quickly

It feels familiar. We've seen other periods where you've had significant drops and then the markets somehow rally in a snap. This is unusual, for something like this to happen where you drop significantly and rally back as quickly. The closest thing might have been a pandemic.

I still think multiples matter here, and growth is going to slow. The markets have rallied, which is great. We may see some more deals, and that's great. I want to see when the data turns down how the market's going to react, and that'll tell me a lot about whether we're priced correctly or not.

Obviously, if the markets hold up when the data turns down, then you've got to go, “Wow, what's going on here?” I'm not convinced that's going to happen. I don't expect a significant decline. I think it's possible we can go back toward the lows, which is 10% to 15%. So it's not a calamity.

What Trump did recently actually raises the floor and eliminates perhaps the dire scenario. I view it as we're sort of in a trading range for a while.

So what changes the most in terms of how one should think and act in this environment?

3. PMs Raise The Bar

I'll tell you how my PMs think. They came into 2025 having had a phenomenal 2024. Multiples went up. Everything worked. I was trying to get them to think that we're in a different regime, and what worked in the past is not going to work this year.

You have to keep the bar higher. You can't assume everything is going to work. Obviously, with names that are data-dependent and impacted by these tariffs, you have to be careful. A lot of them have rallied back significantly.

With slowing growth and, I'll say it again, multiples being on the higher side, I think that's a mix that doesn't give you much upside. Obviously, each sector is a little bit different, but on an index level, you have to be a little bit more conservative.

So, it's a sideways market?

I think so. Markets don't have to go up every year. It felt that way for a while, but when you look back in history, markets can go sideways, and that's perfectly normal.

Hold on here. I thought I'd turned my phone off. All right, there you go. When the noise gets loud—and I could have taken that; it was an important call—what do you trust first: your analysis, your instincts, or the tape?

I think the first thing is your analysis. It all comes back to facts, or what you perceive to be facts. The second part is pattern recognition.

It may not exactly look the same, but if you've been around for a while—and I've been trading markets for almost, I mean, too long, but 47 or 48 years—you've seen a lot. There are moments that may not be exactly the same, but they rhyme in that journey.

Talk to us about self-doubt. Has it helped you, or have you found a way to overcome it?

4. Process Beats Self Doubt

You always have doubt. The way I equate it, I own a baseball team, right? I have some of the greatest players in baseball, and they go through slumps and start to doubt themselves.

When things aren't going right, the only thing you can go to is your process. Are you doing your process? Sometimes nothing is 100%. I can have ballplayers go 0 for 20, and yet it's okay because they've been hitting the ball hard. They just got unlucky.

It gets back to the fact that you're not always going to get it right. But if your process is consistent and you believe in your process, you can still always have self-doubt. That's a whole other topic. You could be doing phenomenally, have 2 bad days, and start to have self-doubt.

You have to remind yourself that this is going to happen, and it's perfectly normal. Just like my ballplayers go through slumps, you're going to go through slumps, too.

There's also often this need to keep proving yourself, especially when expectations rise after a great run. For the people you mentor, how do you help them manage those internal or self-imposed pressures?

I'll go back to 2024. A lot of our PMs had years that were in the 50% to 75% range relative to their normal average. So now they get into 2025, and they're starting to put pressure on themselves to make that happen again.

That was an extraordinary period in 2024. You say, “Thank you,” for an environment that was fairly easy to make money in. But the reality is, that's not the way it normally works. You have to be a little bit more pragmatic and just—I always say, “I don't create the world; I have to live in the world.”

If the world that's presented to me is more difficult, you have to lower your expectations.

What else have you found in terms of common limiting beliefs or self-sabotaging patterns that hold talented investors back?

I've run into all types. Some people hit a certain number, they've made a certain amount of money, and somehow they have this notion in their head that, by making that type of money, they're done. They accomplished what they wanted to accomplish.

That's as opposed to the people who are passionate about what they do and are constantly adapting, evolving, and learning new things. It's about challenging yourself. The beauty of what we do for a living is that it's dynamic. It's always changing.

The ability to embrace that and enjoy it for what it is, and not feel like, “I'm at a certain point; I'm done”—there may be people around you who say, “What do you need it for?” As I was building my business, I had people along the way saying, “You're doing just fine. What do you need to keep going for?”

They don't know what it's like to take it to the next level and build something, and maybe they've never done it. They don't even know what the experience is like. There are always people around you like that. Or you have these notions—you learn somewhere along the way that something may be true, but it may not be true.

It may just be something you thought was true or something someone told you, but that doesn't necessarily mean that's the way it is.

Have you ever hit an upper limit in your own journey—something you had to work your way through?

There are always moments when you take your foot off the gas a little bit or give yourself a break. I just find that boring, though. I'm hardwired; I can't help it.

If I start slacking off, I remind myself what it takes, then get back on the horse and get going again.

When did you realize that success doesn't guarantee peace?

5. Success Does Not Guarantee Peace

You can be successful and be miserable. I know plenty of people like that. I'm sure you do, too.

Peace is something else. Peace is being happy in your life, enjoying what you do for the sake of doing it, and having people around you who care about you and whom you care about.

If everything's just focused on work, when it doesn't go that well, what do you have to fall back on? At least I can go home. I've got a great wife, a great family. I can go home and feel comfortable and safe and happy and laugh, and that just makes it so much better because then when I go back to work, I'm feeling good, rested, feeling good. I don't have these other stresses that other people may have. And I think that's probably been helpful, really helpful, in being able to do the things I want to do.

Let's touch on that, because what people admire publicly is made possible by how we spend our time in our private moments, quietly. So what role has home life specifically played in helping you sustain your drive and allowing you to perform at a high level over the years?

I keep coming back to the fact that I have such little stress at home. I have a great relationship with my wife. We love spending time together. This is my second wife. My first wife wasn't that way. I call that my blue period. It was just the opposite.

When you're stressed and you have a stressful job, there are times when you're under stress at work for whatever reason, and you're stressed at home. That's hard, right? It's hard to deal with all of it, and you're a human being. How much stress can anybody take? If you can eliminate or make your life better in the places that are important to you, it just allows you the ability to manage everything else.

Is there something you appreciate more now than you did earlier in your career?

As I get older, I'm much more appreciative of everything. I can pinch myself. I'm a lucky guy. I don't know how this happened. I know I worked hard, all that good stuff, but it didn't have to turn out this way. I'm just loving everything I'm doing right now. And yet I've expanded what I do and give myself time to explore other things. It's just a great place to be.

It's been a year now since you stepped away from the screens. If you were to look at the next 5 years as a chapter in your life, what would be the central theme?

6. Life Moves Beyond Markets

Wow. It's weird because I'm going to be 69, right? Time is not forever. I'm much more cognizant of where I spend my time, what I do with my time, making sure I'm spending it with the people I want to spend it with. There's just no time to waste.

What else comes to mind?

As far as what?

In terms of what's important to you in the next 5 years.

I want to win a World Series, right? That would be kind of fun. At this point, it's more about—the whole Mets thing, as an example, is taking advantage of doing something. I said in my original press conference, to do something that would make millions of people happy.

It's not a profitable venture. No one would run a sports team the way I'm running this right now. It's a little insane. But it's worthwhile because when I go to the stadium, when I see people's faces, when I see how much enjoyment they're getting out of the team, out of following the Mets, as an example, it just—it's cool.

It doesn't just have to be running a hedge fund. There are so many different ways. So many of the skills that I've learned running a hedge fund, I can now use in so many different places. And that's not all. I'm out here speaking. I never used to speak. I was petrified to get out in front of an audience, and now I don't care. I'm actually like, yeah, sure, happy to do it.

I call it now I'm on the rubber chicken circuit, but it comes from stretching yourself a little bit, doing things that you never used to do, that don't feel very comfortable, and then realizing, hey, I could do this. That's kind of fun, and it's kind of empowering and kind of emboldens you to go, okay, what's next?

I'm trying to build at the stadium, trying to win the casino license, and build a hotel, music venue—5,000 seats—with my partner, Hard Rock. It's going to be a tremendous project that's going to employ people, that's going to create a destination around the ballpark that New York doesn't have. It's an example of taking some of the skills that I have in one place and transporting them to another place, and making something happen that seems impossible but might just happen, which is kind of cool.

Let's end with a few quick hits. Just say the first thing that comes to your mind. Right now, the market feels...

Toppy.

The part of the process you cannot skip is...

Preparation. Great preparation takes care of a lot of potential mistakes.

When a young investor faces their first real drawdown, the most important thing to remember is...

It's not the end of the world, right? Everyone has scars in the markets, and you should take it as a badge of honor.

One thing you're still trying to figure out?

I don't know. I deal with a lot of people, and trying to figure out what's going through their mind is a tough thing to do.

The habit that has made the biggest difference in your career is...

Habit. God, I'm relentless. I'm hardwired. I just don't give up. I've gone through some tough stuff along the way that wasn't fun, and I'm still here, doing stuff that I'm excited by. I'm just tenacious. I can't help it.

If the real game isn't money or markets, but becoming who we're meant to be, what would the younger Steve be most proud of? Not in terms of what you've achieved, but in terms of who you've become?

God, that sounds like a little bit of bragging or something. My dad taught me to be humble. It's not about me anymore. It's about how I affect other people and how I do things that are bigger than me. I consider myself irrelevant. It's about everything else.

Steve, thank you—not just for sharing your practical wisdom on how to navigate this market, but for sharing what it takes to navigate a life in this.

Thank you, too.

Thanks, everybody. Keep going.