Who

Barakett is head of Atticus Capital, a hedge fund with $16 billion under management.

Backstory

Tim Barakett played hockey at Harvard and was so skilled on the ice (he scored 79 goals his senior year), he was drafted by the New Jersey Devils in 1986. He turned down the offer and opted to go to Harvard Business School instead. After cutting his teeth at the merger arbitrage fund Junction Advisors in the early '90s, he founded Atticus Capital in 1995, teaming up with Nathaniel Rothschild, scion of the legendary moneyed family and the man in line to be the fifth Baron Rothschild. Although the fund struggled in the early naughts—it was down 10 percent in 2002—it later made a mint with investments in the financial services sector. Barakett has since become one of Wall Street's most respected younger hedge fund managers and the firm's successes have helped swell its coffers: Although Atticus managed some $2 billion in the early '00s, it now has some $16 billion under management. (The firm stopped accepting new investors in 2006.) In 2007, Atticus's two funds returned 25 and 28 percent respectively, thanks to bets on Freeport-McMoran and MasterCard. Barakett oversees Atticus's New York office while Rothschild manages the firm's presence in London.

Keeping score

Barakett is said to have taken home $400 to $500 million in 2006, according to Trader Monthly magazine. He did even better in 2007: Alpha magazine estimates he walked away with $750 million.

Personal

Barakett lives on West 57th Street. His brother, Brett, lives in Greenwich and runs his own hedge fund, Tremblant Capital.