It seems to me that the continued debate over whether or not the market is random (or whether it is not), is very similar to the debate of nature vs nurture.<p>My instincts, and my conclusion is that there is an element of both randomness and non-randomness in the market. I would expect then that there would be both successful and non-successful actors who succeed/fail due to random and non-random factors. My gut further leads me to believe that having insight or knowledge of the market coupled with a very large bankroll would allow you to ride the random events/waves with prudent mitigation strategies. A hedge, if you would. My expectation also would be then you could measure almost any fund on some arbitrary timeline and argue that the traders either knew or didn't know what they were doing, and that because of random event XYZ they either failed to correctly predict market movement ABC over period IJK. Let's not even get into the MNO or DEF parts!
Whatever "culture" of radical honesty they have does not translate at all to other workplaces. My first experience with an ex-BW manager left me crying at the coffee machine all afternoon. just my n=1 anecdote.
Ray Dalio has a 30 minute YouTube video:<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHe0bXAIuk0" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHe0bXAIuk0</a>
All investment funds are a charade. The probability that a firm like Bridgewater exists with higher than average returns is not zero. Nothing about Bridgewater would indicate that they somehow 'get it' whilst the other funds don't. It's strictly probability, or more accurately, it's strictly a bell-curve.