From Turkey to the U.S., This Self-Taught “Stock Market Wizard” has Consistently Produced Strong Returns

RPD Fund Management’s Fortress Fund has enjoyed positive returns in 29 of its 30 months, with 2025’s year-to-date return at 6.06% net through the end of July. In an interview with Hedge Fund Alpha, Ahmet Okumus, chief investment officer of RPD Fund Management, shared his philosophy for investing and insight into how they’ve managed such a consistent track record.

A disciplined point of view

Okumus started RPD Fund Management in early 2021 after running the successful hedge fund Okumus Capital between 1997 and 2008.

Okumus and his team are bottom-up, fundamental stock pickers with a deep value investment style, which he said is a rare breed these days. They only invest if and when the companies they’re watching trade at certain prices and at a big discount to intrinsic value. Otherwise, the RPD team has no interest in owning them.

The long/ short equity fund determines its exposure based on its ideas, not having to be fully invested at any given time.

“If you look at our exposure over the years, you’ll see it shift from very heavily to very lightly invested," Okumus explained. "It all depends on whether we find ideas that meet our disciplined investment criteria. It’s a rigorous, fundamental, and highly discretionary process."

A value investor from the get-go

Okumus grew up in Turkey, coming to the U.S. in 1989 to attend college. He actually started investing when he was in high school, buying stock in the well-known Turkish conglomerate Enka Holding. It was a home run, and Okumus credits that investment with getting him hooked on investing.

He said he was a value investor from that very first stock he bought in 1986. Okumus bought Enka Holding because its price was plunging every day, and he didn’t think it made logical sense. He felt it was a good company with a good reputation and solid business, so he didn’t think it made sense that its stock should fall so much. After he bought Enka Holding, the price stopped dropping in the next day or two and then rallied, rising every day and piquing his interest in investing.

Between 1986 and 1989, Okumus really started investing and researching, teaching himself the art of investing by logic and looking at metrics like sales and profitability. He didn’t read any book back then; he was entirely self-taught. It turned out that the metrics he began to use on his own were commonly used metrics like P/E, growth rate and other profitability metrics widely in use then and now.

“It all made logical sense to me," Okumus said. "I kept doing well, not just on that first Enka trade, but consistently after. That’s when I thought, ‘Maybe I have a knack for this.’ I came to the U.S. in 1989 for college, and investing quickly became my focus."

Compounding money

“Between 1992 and 1997, I grew my initial $15,000 of personal capital into $2.4 million—entirely through capital appreciation," Okumus added. "The performance was audited, and it laid the foundation for launching my first fund, the Okumus Opportunity Fund, in 1997, which went on to perform very well.”

Primarily a long investor, Okumus didn’t do much shorting while running his first fund, and he made money every single year.

“Even during the tough years of 2000, 2001 and 2002, we made money every year being primarily long in the tech space," he said. "Over the first nine years, the fund compounded at 29% annually. I was fortunate to have a chapter featured in Jack Schwager’s famous book, The New Market Wizards, alongside several well-known investors."