USATODAY.com - $363M is average pay for top hedge fund managers

USATODAY.com - $363M is average pay for top hedge fund managers: "NEW YORK — James Simons, a mathematician turned money manager who prefers hiring Ph.D.s over MBAs, inched out oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens Jr. as the world's best-paid hedge fund manager in 2005, collecting an estimated $1.5 billion, according to rankings released today by Institutional Investor's Alpha magazine.

In rising to the top of what amounts to a who's who list of the secretive hedge fund world, Simons, of Renaissance Technologies, unseated 2004's top earner and first-ever billion-dollar man, Edward Lampert of ESL Investments, who is best known for buying Kmart and masterminding the blockbuster deal to buy Sears. Lampert's earnings dipped to an estimated $425 million last year, down from $1.0 billion in 2004.

'These are staggering numbers,' said Alpha editor Michael Peltz in announcing its fifth-annual list of Top 25 earners. 'It took $130 million to make the list.'

Pickens also topped $1 billion, earning an estimated $1.4 billion. The average pay of the 26 (there was a tie for 25th place) on the list was $363 million, up 45% from $251 million in 2004."