As I shared yesterday, I read The Bond King, a biography about famous investor Bill Gross and the investing empire he built with PIMCO. Two other things stood out to me about Gross’s story that I’ve been thinking about this week.

Even though he founded PIMCO, Gross wasn’t an entrepreneur. He started PIMCO as an experiment within the insurance company he was working for in the 1970s, Pacific Mutual Life Insurance Company. Pacific Mutual gave him and a few others $5 million to test out their bond strategies. By taking the intrapreneur route, Gross could enjoy a comfortable salary, not spend months or years trying to raise money from LPs for a fund, and use the resources and infrastructure of his employer. PIMCO made Gross a billionaire even though he wasn’t an entrepreneur and his risk was significantly reduced.

The other thing that stood out to me was the culture at PIMCO. It was sharp-elbowed and competitive, which helped them for decades. They pushed the boundaries, and it doesn’t sound like it was a fun place to work. It was an intense pressure cooker that paid extremely high salaries. People hated it, but they couldn’t leave. The culture Gross created ended up being a big part of the reason he was forced to leave abruptly.  

Bill Gross and the PIMCO story are fascinating. He’s a super-eccentric guy. He accomplished a lot, but his eccentric ways had many downsides.