Am I underpaid, or is he overpaid?

Now, I'm not saying that David Tepper is being overpaid (well, actually I am), but he was paid my annual salary for every 6 minutes he worked in 2009! And although a 120 percent rate of return in excellent, a performance fee of 30% seems a bit rich -- especially since he won't be handing any of it back in bad years (like 2008, when his fund earned -25%). Overall, such performance fee structures seem designed mainly to transfer as much of the fund investors wealth into the fund managers pockets as quickly as possible.

For example, if such a fund started out with a value of $100b and made 120% in one year (and was paid a 5% base fee plus a 30% performance fee) and then -25% return the next (and was 'only' paid a typical minimum 5% base fee), the investors would end up with a return of around $34b over two years, while the fund managers would have been paid $40b in fees...

The $30 million pounds paid to Crispin Odey, a British hedge fund manager who made similar bets in 2009, seems a more reasonable payment for exceptional hedge fund management.

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