{"id":212688,"date":"2026-03-31T07:25:25","date_gmt":"2026-03-31T07:25:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/212688\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T07:25:25","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T07:25:25","slug":"ken-griffin-wants-to-reshape-miami-and-maybe-american-politics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/212688\/","title":{"rendered":"Ken Griffin wants to reshape Miami\u2014and maybe American politics"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/ranking\/most-powerful-people\/2025\/ken-griffin\/\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/ranking\/most-powerful-people\/2025\/ken-griffin\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Ken Griffin<\/a> is pointing an outstretched arm toward his field of dreams. On this Wednesday afternoon in early February, the CEO of Citadel, one of the world\u2019s largest and most profitable hedge funds, is holding court, attired in his signature blue suit and saddle shoes, sans jacket for the moment. With Biscayne Bay glittering a vivid turquoise in the distance, he stands framed by floor-to-ceiling windows on the 27th floor of a skyscraper where he has temporarily parked Citadel\u2019s offices, while he awaits completion of the <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/2024\/08\/26\/ken-griffin-citadel-miami-florida-headquarters\/\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/2024\/08\/26\/ken-griffin-citadel-miami-florida-headquarters\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">crown-jewel headquarters<\/a>, a gracefully tapered, 54-story Norman Foster design, slated for completion in 2030 at a cost recently estimated at $2.5 billion. Extols Griffin, \u201cWe\u2019re constructing an iconic office building for this century, right here in Miami, in the free state of Florida, on the water. And people from some of the biggest tech companies in the world who\u2019ve seen the design are saying, \u2018We want to be there!\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n<p>He is adamant about one thing: This could not have happened in Chicago, or New York, or maybe anywhere but here. Griffin\u2019s tone grows rhapsodic as he describes how Miami authorities coordinated like a Navy SEALs team to fast-track his vision on Biscayne Bay. The dynamic is what Griffin lauds as Miami hustle. The city and county leadership, under a Republican and Democrat, respectively, share a \u201cwe\u2019re open for business\u201d mindset. Miami-Dade County designated the Citadel site as part of a rapid transit zone, special areas where the authorities greatly expedite the zoning approval process. Citadel won approval in around 18 months\u2014for a megaproject that would have taken years to be green-lighted in virtually any other major metro.<\/p>\n<p>For Griffin, the 1,049-foot-high billboard represents a dual ascension: of Miami as a major business capital, and his own growing prominence as a leader. He has established himself as one of the biggest financial power players\u2014if not the biggest\u2014in modern Republican politics. With a net worth estimated at roughly $50 billion, over the past decade he has donated almost a quarter of a billion dollars to candidates ranging from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to Senators Tim Sheehy (R-Mont.) and Dave <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/mccormick\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/mccormick\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">McCormick<\/a> (R-Pa.), supporting causes close to his heart. And a little more than one year into the second term of Trump\u2014a Republican he has never donated to\u2014Griffin has been the rare business voice that has grown louder and <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/2025\/09\/27\/ken-griffin-inflation-warning-trump-republicans-midterm-elections-fed-independence\/\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/2025\/09\/27\/ken-griffin-inflation-warning-trump-republicans-midterm-elections-fed-independence\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">more critical<\/a> of what he sees as the president\u2019s wrong turns. Though he supports some of the president\u2019s policies (more on that later) it galls him that so many fellow CEOs are forced to curry favor at the White House. He feels the regime of tariffs \u201cencourages crony capitalism,\u201d he <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/2026\/02\/04\/ken-griffin-ceo-sucking-up-white-house\/\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/2026\/02\/04\/ken-griffin-ceo-sucking-up-white-house\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">asserts<\/a>. \u201cCEOs have to stomach going to D.C. and sucking up to one administration after another.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Griffin instead is looking beyond MAGA, to the next chapter of Republican politics. His ideal vision weaves together classic conservative policies (lower taxes, free trade, fewer regulations, school choice, pro-growth policies in cities) with things he simply believes are essential to a booming economy (immigration, an end to cronyism, keeping government out of picking winners and losers). And, in fact, that ideal mix is pretty close to what he\u2019s found in South Florida.<\/p>\n<p><img data-cy=\"article-image\" alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"960\" height=\"640\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"transition-opacity duration-300 lazyload wp-image-4448215 not-prose w-full\" style=\"color:transparent;background-size:cover;background-position:50% 50%;background-repeat:no-repeat;background-image:url(&quot;data:image\/svg+xml;charset=utf-8,%3Csvg xmlns='http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg' viewBox='0 0 960 640'%3E%3Cfilter id='b' color-interpolation-filters='sRGB'%3E%3CfeGaussianBlur stdDeviation='20'\/%3E%3CfeColorMatrix values='1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 100 -1' result='s'\/%3E%3CfeFlood x='0' y='0' width='100%25' height='100%25'\/%3E%3CfeComposite operator='out' in='s'\/%3E%3CfeComposite in2='SourceGraphic'\/%3E%3CfeGaussianBlur stdDeviation='20'\/%3E%3C\/filter%3E%3Cimage width='100%25' height='100%25' x='0' y='0' preserveAspectRatio='none' style='filter: url(%23b);' href='data:image\/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAEAAAABCAQAAAC1HAwCAAAAC0lEQVR4nGNgYAAAAAMAASsJTYQAAAAASUVORK5CYII='\/%3E%3C\/svg%3E&quot;)\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Citadel-HQ-Rendering-2_v1.jpg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>COURTESY OF Citadel<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe fight in America is all about protecting the cultures in places like Miami or Silicon Valley, and keeping us a nation of entrepreneurs. That\u2019s really important because small enterprises will hire anyone who\u2019s talented and willing to work hard whether you went to college or not,\u201d he says. There is an optimism in his voice that is rare these days. Indeed, while many are \u201cshorting\u201d America\u2019s prospects, Griffin is buying. And this certainly isn\u2019t the first time one of his contrarian bets has paid off. He built Citadel not by hiring the typical cast of MBAs but engaging the likes of mathematicians, statisticians, and physicists who boasted great quant skills and learned finance fast. In mid-2022, <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/2022\/11\/08\/citadel-billionaire-founder-ken-griffin-not-low-taxes-led-move-company-from-chicago-to-miami\/\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/2022\/11\/08\/citadel-billionaire-founder-ken-griffin-not-low-taxes-led-move-company-from-chicago-to-miami\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">fed up<\/a> with Chicago\u2019s failing schools, crime, and politicians, he <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/2025\/09\/27\/ken-griffin-inflation-warning-trump-republicans-midterm-elections-fed-independence\/\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/2025\/09\/27\/ken-griffin-inflation-warning-trump-republicans-midterm-elections-fed-independence\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">moved Citadel\u2019s base to Miami<\/a> in what was arguably the most stunning corporate relocation in decades.<\/p>\n<p>Griffin is rich, and he\u2019s fearless, that much is not in doubt. And given his incredible wealth and potential influence going forward, it\u2019s worth understanding where Griffin came from and how he developed a set of beliefs about society and the economy. Because if Ken Griffin believes there\u2019s a path to remaking American capitalism\u2014based on what he sees working in Miami\u2014he might be one of the few people on the planet with the money and influence to make it happen.<\/p>\n<p>In the past, Miami, and Florida overall, haven\u2019t ranked as major business centers. The economy of Miami long depended primarily on tourism, wealth management, and residential construction. Miami wasn\u2019t a place like Silicon Valley, Dallas, Minneapolis, or New York where entrepreneurs flocked to build startups into major players in tech, health care, or financial services. To this day, the largest <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/ranking\/fortune500\/\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/ranking\/fortune500\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Fortune 500<\/a> members in Miami-Dade are energy supplier <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/world-fuel-services\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/world-fuel-services\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">World Kinect<\/a> (No. 106), and homebuilder <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/lennar\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/lennar\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Lennar<\/a> (No. 129). Florida isn\u2019t home to any of the nation\u2019s top 50 banks, measured by deposits.<\/p>\n<p>But that\u2019s changing. Post-pandemic, <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/servicenow\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/servicenow\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">ServiceNow<\/a>, Wells Fargo\u2019s wealth management division, Palantir, Thoma Bravo, and Peter Thiel\u2019s Thiel Capital are just a few of the companies that have shifted significant resources to South Florida. McKinsey\u2019s Miami outpost now ranks as one of its fastest-growing offices in North America\u2014its Miami headcount has grown fourfold to several hundred in the past four years\u2014and Spanish <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/banco-santander\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/banco-santander\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Banco Santander<\/a> is raising a 41-story tower in the city\u2019s Brickell neighborhood.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe fight in America is all about protecting the cultures in places like Miami or Silicon Valley, and keeping us a nation of entrepreneurs.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ken Griffin, Founder and CEO, Citadel<\/p>\n<p>Griffin himself towers as a leading pioneer in not one but two distinct realms of finance. The $69 billion hedge fund, his original creation, forged a new model in an industry once dominated by superstar, individual golden-gut traders. By contrast, Citadel \u201catomized\u201d the business by nurturing myriad teams to invest\u2014and centrally managing them with a scientific approach to risk management and diversification.<\/p>\n<p>The second sector: the market maker, Citadel Securities. Hardly a surprise that it\u2019s nicknamed \u201cthe <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/amazon-com\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/amazon-com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Amazon<\/a> of financial services.\u201d It\u2019s the market leader in equity retail trades and handles one in four total transactions in the U.S. Griffin greatly aided the democratization of markets that grew our shareholder society. When you pay zero commissions selling from your account at Fidelity or <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/charles-schwab\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/charles-schwab\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Charles Schwab<\/a>, the probability is high that the Citadel machine found the buyer in nanoseconds. Overall, the firm generates over $10 billion in annual net revenues.<\/p>\n<p>Citadel\u2019s journey to Florida happened almost by accident. It was March 2020 and Griffin, who had for 30-some years been based in Chicago, was deeply worried that with big cities going into COVID lockdown, Citadel Securities would be unable to run its giant trading operation. So in a flurry of activity he clinched a deal to rent the entire 207-room oceanfront Four Seasons Resort in Palm Beach. He and his team sprung into action to relocate its trading floor to the tropics; the campaign was dubbed \u201cOperation Gator.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The city and state governments proved highly cooperative in seeking creative solutions to make the mass replanting happen. A City of Miami spokesman confirmed that the town treated \u201cthe property like a private residence, where people inside can work as they would at home.\u201d A convoy of three tractor trailers working 24\/7 over several days transported everything from desks to monitors to the Four Seasons. Fifty local workers dug trenches in the streets to run network cable to the hotel and installed lines running 70,000 feet. A semitruck pulled up to unload a giant generator that got planted in the parking lot. In just five days, Citadel Securities established 60 trading stations in the ballroom, installing enough capacity to handle its whole business, including supporting its market position in equities and options, for a full year.<\/p>\n<p>During that year, 60 traders lived on-site in three-month shifts, with their spouses and kids, for whom the firm provided dedicated spaces so they could participate in their schools\u2019 remote-learning programs, as well as music lessons. Fifty Four Seasons housekeepers, chefs, and other staff, who otherwise would have been unemployed, occupied a separate part of the hotel. While on-site, they couldn\u2019t take so much as a stroll outside of what the firm dubbed \u201cthe bubble.\u201d Jeff Maurone, COO of technology at Citadel Securities, recalls that Griffin stopped by from his residence in Palm Beach to check on the construction phase, attired in a polo shirt and shorts, accompanied by his son. \u201cKen said that he wanted his son to see the project because it exemplified the American spirit,\u201d notes Maurone. Griffin expressed his wonder at how the Florida authorities, undeterred by COVID, moved so fast. \u201cIt would have taken months in a Northern city,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n<p>It was a giant leap for the firm. But for Griffin, it was also something of a homecoming. He was born in Daytona Beach; his dad worked at Cape Canaveral as a <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/general-electric\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/general-electric\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">General Electric<\/a> project manager on the NASA space program. In the early 1980s, after stints in Minneapolis and Midland, Texas (\u201cWhat a great place for a kid to roam the great outdoors. Have you ever seen Landman?\u201d he raves), the family settled in Boca Raton, where Ken\u2019s father took a senior management position at a manufacturer of concrete roof tile. Griffin spent the full four years at Boca Raton Community High School\u2014and greatly benefited from a highly intellectual, tech-savvy environment in an area best known for attracting beach-loving tourists and retirees. <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/ibm\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/ibm\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">IBM<\/a> developed its first PCs at its lab in Boca, and was manufacturing them in town when Ken started high school.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMost people don\u2019t appreciate that Boca in the \u201980s had an incredibly rich community of engineers and computer scientists,\u201d Griffin said. \u201cTheir children went to the public schools, including Boca High.\u201d According to his math teacher Jim Graziose, the IBM parents coached their kids in programming. To match the progeny of the pros, ambitious kids like Ken had to work extra hard.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn the best thing I ever did was move to Miami for my kids.\u201d The attitude of their teachers in Chicago was damagingly woke.<\/p>\n<p>Griffin, on one of the many things he appreciates about Miami<\/p>\n<p>Griffin\u2019s four-person computer club won the Miami-Dade County championship, and according to coach Graziose, the group generated as much mirth as elegant algorithms. The team harbored a zany obsession over nicknaming one another for heavy-metal stars and other teen music idols. To make money, they published a magazine, mysteriously called Kumquat, illustrated with cartoon images of the crew drawn by a free spirit who went on to design video games for <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/nintendo\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/nintendo\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Nintendo<\/a>. Griffin was \u201cMetal Nerd,\u201d though the only heavy-metal sound that enticed him was the humming of mainframes.<\/p>\n<p>Graziose kept a photo of the quartet in which Griffin looks reed-thin and sports bangs in the ruling Beatles style. He recalls that Griffin was a brilliant student but declined to do any and all homework. \u201cThat forced me to give him B\u2019s instead of A\u2019s,\u201d says Graziose. Griffin didn\u2019t take it personally. He wrote in Graziose\u2019s yearbook, \u201cThanks for always taking my homework! [signed] Metal Nerd.\u201d (Years later, after Graziose\u2019s wife died of the autoimmune condition scleroderma, Griffin made a large contribution to a foundation researching cures for the disease.)<\/p>\n<p>Even then, Griffin was civic-minded. His classmate Nate Adams recalls that he and Griffin joined a group that visited out-of-state companies in an effort to encourage them to move to South Florida. One sojourn took the students as far as Los Angeles, where they lobbied a satellite maker. Unfortunately, as Adams acknowledges, their pitch was about 30 years too early.<\/p>\n<p>Griffin overcame the B\u2019s to shine as the only one in his class admitted to Harvard. In Cambridge, he studied economics, but his real passion had long been parsing and playing the stock market. \u201cIn the third grade, I wrote a paper that set forth that I wanted to learn how the stock market worked,\u201d he remembers. In his freshman year, Griffin found a highly negative story on Home Shopping Network, a seller of baubles on TV, so convincing that he shorted the shares, banking around $5,000. As a returning sophomore in September 1987, he hung a satellite dish from the third-floor window of his dorm room in ivy-covered, turn-of-the-century <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/cabot\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/cabot\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Cabot<\/a> House, not to watch football games but to trade equities. From an \u201coffice\u201d consisting of two phone lines, a futon bed, and the saucer, Griffin went short big-time, and cleaned up when the famed Black Monday crash struck in mid-October.<\/p>\n<p>In 1990, backed by a veteran Chicago hedge fund manager who recognized his talent, Griffin raised $18 million to launch Citadel\u2019s first fund, which was designed to exploit mispricing in convertible bonds. He quickly diversified into equities, and four years later was running a team of 60 that managed a portfolio of $200 million. The firm entered a vast new field in 2002 when Griffin launched its market-making arm, Citadel Securities. Today, Citadel is a leader in both domains and employs around 5,000 worldwide, divided into hundreds of teams of six to 10 members that cover virtually every flavor of investments from options to commodities to fixed income, and on the hedge fund side, quantitative trading.<\/p>\n<p><img data-cy=\"article-image\" alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"790\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"transition-opacity duration-300 lazyload wp-image-4453240 not-prose w-full\" style=\"color:transparent;background-size:cover;background-position:50% 50%;background-repeat:no-repeat;background-image:url(&quot;data:image\/svg+xml;charset=utf-8,%3Csvg xmlns='http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg' viewBox='0 0 1024 790'%3E%3Cfilter id='b' color-interpolation-filters='sRGB'%3E%3CfeGaussianBlur stdDeviation='20'\/%3E%3CfeColorMatrix values='1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 100 -1' result='s'\/%3E%3CfeFlood x='0' y='0' width='100%25' height='100%25'\/%3E%3CfeComposite operator='out' in='s'\/%3E%3CfeComposite in2='SourceGraphic'\/%3E%3CfeGaussianBlur stdDeviation='20'\/%3E%3C\/filter%3E%3Cimage width='100%25' height='100%25' x='0' y='0' preserveAspectRatio='none' style='filter: url(%23b);' href='data:image\/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAEAAAABCAQAAAC1HAwCAAAAC0lEQVR4nGNgYAAAAAMAASsJTYQAAAAASUVORK5CYII='\/%3E%3C\/svg%3E&quot;)\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/GRI_chart_web_032426.png\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Still, it took a post-COVID appeal from the folks who had hunkered down in Palm Beach to clinch his exodus from Chicago. The CEO of Citadel Securities, Peng Zhao, made a pivotal call to action. \u201cPeng walks into my office, and says, \u2018Why did we leave Florida for Chicago?\u2019 And I said, \u2018We kind of left Chicago for Florida,\u2019 \u201d reprises Griffin. Zhao responded, \u201cWe\u2019d like to go back.\u201d After asking, \u201cWho\u2019s we?\u201d Griffin got the decisive answer from his market-making boss: \u201cPretty much the whole management team of Citadel Securities. Life is a lot better in Florida.\u201d The go-getter approach of then-Mayor Francis Suarez also helped. Knowing the bubble\u2019s success and Griffin\u2019s warnings on Chicago\u2019s decline, he paid a sales call to Griffin, showing the CEO empty properties via the <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/alphabet\/\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/alphabet\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Google<\/a> Maps on his iPhone that he lauded as great locations for a new Citadel headquarters.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe best thing I ever did was move to Miami for my kids,\u201d swears Griffin. The attitude of their teachers in Chicago, he told the reporter, was damagingly woke. \u201cIt took a little time for my kids to adjust [to the stricter Miami schools], but before long, they would just come home with smiles on their faces.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Griffin feels \u201coptimism in the air here,\u201d he avows. \u201cIn Northern cities awash in red tape, people talk about crime and how bleak the future is. It\u2019s just much harder to say, \u2018I\u2019ll risk it all and join the startup down the street.\u2019 It\u2019s much easier for people to take the risk of joining a startup in a city with faith in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Citadel now employs around 500 in Miami; the crew includes such top brass as Zhao and Jim Esposito, respectively CEO and president of Citadel Securities; Sebastian Barrack, who for a decade has run the commodities trading franchise; and Griffin himself. Though New York and London are bigger, measured in personnel, Miami is the fastest-growing outpost by far.<\/p>\n<p>Though he\u2019s embraced Miami\u2019s sunshine, almost everyone who meets Griffin (or works for him) comes away with the same impression: He\u2019s incredibly intense. He greets people with a hammer handshake and a piercing blue-eyed stare. He follows what one source who knows him calls \u201cthe broken windows theory of management,\u201d referring to the policing method pursued by New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani in the early 1990s, which involved cracking down on petty crimes. Griffin is renowned for getting extremely cross over what appear to be minor mistakes\u2014don\u2019t hand him a sloppily written memo, for example.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSome people think he\u2019s intense for the sake of being intense, and that he gets fixated on small issues,\u201d says this person. \u201cBut it\u2019s all about his lack of tolerance for complacency that can lead to more, bigger gaffes.\u201d When asked if this characterization is correct, Griffin effectively answered yes, in a circuitous fashion. \u201cI want everybody here to care deeply, and I make sure they do. That\u2019s my job.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And Griffin has another pet peeve: Managers who \u201cwon\u2019t break glass,\u201d meaning make extremely hard calls. \u201cIf a fixed-income team is 10th in Europe, and the guy who\u2019s running the business thinks that\u2019s fine, Ken will say, \u2018That\u2019s not fine. You need to win, you need to be number one,\u2019 \u201d says another source who\u2019s observed Griffin\u2019s management style. \u201cKen is all about winning in every domain.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Sebastian Barrack has for a decade run the legendarily profitable commodities trading franchise. He still marvels at his boss\u2019s ability to identify overlooked forces that can drive prices, a talent enhanced by rare creativity.<\/p>\n<p>As an example, Griffin once asked Barrack to examine how changes in outside temperatures translate into shifts in heating demand\u2014and the subtle timing effects that influence when that demand shows up in energy markets. Asks Barrack, \u201cWho on earth but Ken thinks at that level of granularity?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Griffin prefers Q&amp;A sessions to giving speeches. That\u2019s because he\u2019s such a details guy that he keeps paring the text looking for perfection. In interviews, he doesn\u2019t try to be charming; Griffin sees himself as a truth-teller. He can even show deadpan humor. When asked at one event in West Palm Beach where he\u2019d park \u201ca suitcase full of cash\u201d in the markets, Griffin quipped, \u201cThis sounds like an AML [anti-money-laundering] question, like I gotta call the FBI.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Says Barrack of his boss, \u201cHe\u2019s the fairest human being I have ever met in my life. That fairness can mean he will be brutally honest with me because I haven\u2019t done very well, which doesn\u2019t happen often, fortunately. He\u2019ll also give praise, when it\u2019s deserved, but after the praise he\u2019s back at you with, \u2018Now what\u2019s next?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img data-cy=\"article-image\" alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"transition-opacity duration-300 lazyload wp-image-4448214 not-prose w-full\" style=\"color:transparent;background-size:cover;background-position:50% 50%;background-repeat:no-repeat;background-image:url(&quot;data:image\/svg+xml;charset=utf-8,%3Csvg xmlns='http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg' viewBox='0 0 1024 768'%3E%3Cfilter id='b' color-interpolation-filters='sRGB'%3E%3CfeGaussianBlur stdDeviation='20'\/%3E%3CfeColorMatrix values='1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 100 -1' result='s'\/%3E%3CfeFlood x='0' y='0' width='100%25' height='100%25'\/%3E%3CfeComposite operator='out' in='s'\/%3E%3CfeComposite in2='SourceGraphic'\/%3E%3CfeGaussianBlur stdDeviation='20'\/%3E%3C\/filter%3E%3Cimage width='100%25' height='100%25' x='0' y='0' preserveAspectRatio='none' style='filter: url(%23b);' href='data:image\/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAEAAAABCAQAAAC1HAwCAAAAC0lEQVR4nGNgYAAAAAMAASsJTYQAAAAASUVORK5CYII='\/%3E%3C\/svg%3E&quot;)\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/PBB-1_v1-e1774373278401.jpeg\"\/>During COVID, the firm took over the entire Four Seasons Resort and kept Citadel Securities running full tilt.<\/p>\n<p>COURTESY OF CITADEL SECURITIES<\/p>\n<p>What\u2019s next for Griffin himself is a topic that comes up a lot these days. Certainly the road to fashioning Miami into a global business leader will be long and arduous\u2014and Griffin knows it. The Miami-Dade population has ballooned by over 300,000, or 11%, in just three years. Result: The housing supply has hugely lagged. Median home prices have doubled to $675,000 since the summer of 2019, and rents have risen comparably.<\/p>\n<p>Plus, even lovers of low taxes will concede that Miami\u2019s mass-transit network is extremely underdeveloped compared with New York or Chicago. Commuters to downtown, for example, can spend well over an hour in traffic when making the 15-mile trip from Doral to Brickell. \u201cMiami is suffering from disjointed development where infrastructure isn\u2019t keeping up with population growth,\u201d notes Ned Murray of the Jorge M. P\u00e9rez Metropolitan Center at Florida International University.<\/p>\n<p>The city and county will have to tackle traffic, but Griffin is leading a philanthropic campaign beating anything the city, or almost any other metro, has witnessed in recent decades. To date, he\u2019s donated $350 million to an array of causes advancing health care, education, public safety, the arts, and more. Griffin also gives employees who serve on nonprofit boards as part of Citadel\u2019s community leaders program up to $20,000 to contribute to those organizations.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s still left plenty of room for his personal real estate projects: He\u2019s spent a total of $270 million on properties in <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/www.miamiluxuryhomes.com\/record-breaking-sale-ken-griffin-pays-107-million-for-adrienne-arshts-coconut-grove-waterfront-compound\/\" href=\"https:\/\/www.miamiluxuryhomes.com\/record-breaking-sale-ken-griffin-pays-107-million-for-adrienne-arshts-coconut-grove-waterfront-compound\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Coconut Grove<\/a> and <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/www.lvebproperties.com\/en\/billionaire-hedge-funder-ken-griffin-pays-37m-for-star-island-property\/\" href=\"https:\/\/www.lvebproperties.com\/en\/billionaire-hedge-funder-ken-griffin-pays-37m-for-star-island-property\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Star Island<\/a>. But his epic project is a stupendous, oceanfront complex in Palm Beach. At 27 acres, it occupies more property than the \u201cwinter White House,\u201d 23-acre Mar-a-Lago, a quarter-mile down the street.<\/p>\n<p>But billionaires haven\u2019t always had the easiest time \u201cconnecting\u201d in the political realm. Griffin cuts a particularly interesting figure at the moment because his beliefs don\u2019t match up neatly with either party\u2014starting with free trade. \u201cThe concerns about U.S. competitiveness and the resiliency of the supply chain that the administration is trying to address are real,\u201d says Griffin. \u201cBut <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/2024\/11\/18\/ken-griffin-citadel-donald-trump-tariffs-immigration-mass-deportation\/\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/2024\/11\/18\/ken-griffin-citadel-donald-trump-tariffs-immigration-mass-deportation\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">tariffs are the wrong tool<\/a>. They function as a regressive tax\u2014essentially a sales tax on the American people that will hit those working to make ends meet the hardest.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Griffin has said that the Trump administration has made significant progress securing the southern border. At the same time, he\u2019s stressed that the U.S. should continue to welcome talented people from around the world. \u201cThe southern border was the source of people willing to do tough jobs for modest wages\u2014building houses, washing dishes, picking crops,\u201d he says. \u201cReducing immigration will bring higher prices for groceries, housing, and food. We\u2019ve rolled back the welcome mat too much.\u201d He states that any foreign student graduating from a U.S. college or graduate school \u201cshould get a [work] visa stamped to their degree.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Griffin believes that the current restrictions limit America\u2019s access to the <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/2025\/11\/12\/trump-100000-h1b-fee-says-need-foreign-workers-fox-news-interview\/\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/2025\/11\/12\/trump-100000-h1b-fee-says-need-foreign-workers-fox-news-interview\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">world\u2019s best minds<\/a>. He notes that immigrants or children of immigrants launched most of the successful Silicon Valley startups, including in AI. Griffin hammers the point by noting that his co-chief investment officer hails from Ecuador; the head of the trading unit from mainland China; the commodities chief from Australia; and Citadel\u2019s most successful equity fund manager from the U.K. For Griffin, his hometown\u2019s success is a tribute to the power of immigration: 54% of Miami-Dade County\u2019s residents were born abroad.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cReducing immigration will bring higher prices for groceries, housing, and food. We\u2019ve rolled back the welcome mat too much.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ken Griffin, Citadel<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s important to note, however, that Griffin praises a number of the president\u2019s policies. A winner, he says, is scotching the four-year \u201cregulatory onslaught\u201d under <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/videos\/watch\/biden-seeks-to-regulate-ai-through-executive-order\/0ef8a040-b19a-461f-a382-403b598d4ff3\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/videos\/watch\/biden-seeks-to-regulate-ai-through-executive-order\/0ef8a040-b19a-461f-a382-403b598d4ff3\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">President Biden<\/a>. \u201cThat\u2019s the biggest sea change,\u201d he intones. \u201cYou cannot imagine how painful it was every day under the Biden administration to look at what crazy new proposal was being put in place. [Under Trump] it\u2019s a giant sigh of relief that I can go on building my business instead of having a second job dealing with regulations that accomplish nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>If pressed on his biggest worry, the man who knows more about the U.S. Treasury market than perhaps any other human cites the spiraling budget deficit. \u201cIn financial markets, no brand can compare to the brand of U.S. Treasuries,\u201d he maintains. Their creditworthiness gives the U.S. extraordinary access to credit. But our gigantic <a aria-label=\"Go to https:\/\/fortune.com\/2026\/03\/30\/jerome-powell-39-trillion-national-debt-not-unsustainable-will-not-end-well\/\" href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/2026\/03\/30\/jerome-powell-39-trillion-national-debt-not-unsustainable-will-not-end-well\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">budget deficits and debt<\/a> at 6% and well over 100% of GDP respectively have put the U.S. \u201cin a more fiscally precarious position than we\u2019ve been in decades.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Griffin doesn\u2019t limit his views to U.S. economic policy, far from it. He eagerly tackles questions on broad international issues: \u201cAmerica\u2019s relationships with its historical allies are extremely important, especially as competition with China increasingly shapes the global landscape. Allowing those ties to fray would be a mistake.\u201d Europe must \u201cembrace a radically new set of policies\u201d that promote entrepreneurship \u201cto accelerate economic growth, support its aging population, and strengthen its military capacity,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n<p>All of which leads one to wonder, what is Griffin really envisioning for his final act? At the close of the meeting in his Brickell conference room, the reporter asked Griffin if he\u2019d consider stepping forward as a political candidate. \u201cNot today,\u201d he responded. \u201cI would never say never. I\u2019m 57 years old. I have another 25 or 30 years, I hope, of working hard and giving back to society.\u201d Asked if he\u2019d accept an offer to be secretary of the Treasury, Griffin said, \u201cI\u2019m not trying to be coy. There will be something after Citadel. Hank Paulson served as secretary of the Treasury and did a great job. It would be great if there was a chapter in my life that looked like what he did. That chapter is not to be written right here, right now.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Nate Adams, Griffin\u2019s old friend from Boca High who worked as a top advisor to former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, views Griffin as a great future candidate for high office, and friends rate him as presidential timber. \u201cI\u2019m one of the ones promoting [a possible run for office],\u201d Adams says. But those close to Griffin believe he won\u2019t embrace retail politics and go on a ballot. Glad-handing in New Hampshire at diners and churches isn\u2019t likely to excite him. But one thing\u2019s for sure: Griffin is going long on his vision for America\u2019s economy. And as many have learned the hard way in the financial markets, he\u2019s a dangerous trader to bet against.<\/p>\n<p>This article appears in the April\/May 2026 issue of Fortune with the headline \u201cKen Griffin\u2019s biggest bet.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ken Griffin is pointing an outstretched arm toward his field of dreams. On this Wednesday afternoon in early&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":212689,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[97256,16331,59597,11563,409,802,123,125,124],"class_list":{"0":"post-212688","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-miami","8":"tag-apple-only","9":"tag-billionaires","10":"tag-citadel","11":"tag-debt","12":"tag-donald-trump","13":"tag-ken-griffin","14":"tag-miami","15":"tag-miami-headlines","16":"tag-miami-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=212688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212688\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/212689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=212688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=212688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=212688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}