Statement on a Recent Book about Ray Dalio and Bridgewater Associates

The book should be taken for what it is, which is another one of those sensational and inaccurate tabloid books written to sell books to people who like gossip. The only thing that's different about this one is that it's about me and Bridgewater. Like all such books, there is a backstory behind it. In brief, the author applied for a job at Bridgewater and was rejected. He then became an investigative reporter at a prominent newspaper and made a career of writing distorted stories about me and Bridgewater, at first in articles and now in this book. He did this by speaking with former employees who had been dismissed, seeking out negative rumors, and bending these into false narratives. Since he had no direct contact with the events he describes, he obviously took the tidbits he got from others and made up his descriptions of what happened to suit his objective. In fact, the author states in the preface that the book is filled with made-up dialogue, and he shows in the endnotes that many statements he makes about what happened were said to be untrue by the people he describes. He even went so far as to include a despicable false story about my deceased son and me from over 30 years ago.

Bridgewater obviously is not and was not as he describes it. If it were, it wouldn't have had so many happy employees who have stayed so long (about one-third have been there for over 10 years) and it wouldn't have such great client loyalty and longevity (the average client has been with Bridgewater for 12 years). So this book is more a sign of the times when bad journalism is more a fiction than a source of truth.

As for what I expect to happen, I expect that the author will promote his book by saying outlandish things, people will make what they make of it, and I will keep doing what I'm doing without being distracted by it. I suspect that most people won't be drawn into the gossip and will continue to decide for themselves whether or not what I'm passing along is of value to them. If they like it, I will keep providing it. If they don't, I won't. Also, the book won't matter to people who know Bridgewater and me well, and they are the people who matter most to me. I suggest that you take this book for what it is and not get distracted by it, but do what you like with it. From this point on, I'm not going to give it more attention.