You probably remember the scene. Brad Pitt, looking scruffy and somewhat annoyed, stands in a crowded pub in England. He is frantically typing on a laptop, trying to sell off millions of dollars in credit default swaps while the global economy screams toward a cliff. That character, Ben Rickert, is the moral anchor of The Big Short. He’s the guy who told two young, over-excited traders to stop dancing because they were essentially betting on the end of the world.
But here is the thing. Ben Rickert isn’t real. Well, the name isn't.
In the real world, the man behind the beard is Ben Hockett. While Hollywood took some liberties to make the story punchier, the reality of Ben Rickert in The Big Short is actually much weirder and more interesting than the movie lets on. He wasn’t just a retired banker who did a favor for some neighbors. He was the secret weapon of Cornwall Capital, the small "garage band" hedge fund that turned $110,000 into a $120 million payday.
The Man Behind the Ben Rickert Persona
Most people think Rickert was just a grumpy mentor. Honestly, that’s a bit of an undersell. Ben Hockett was a former high-level trader at Deutsche Bank. He didn't just understand the market; he knew how the pipes worked. When Jamie Mai and Charlie Ledley (the real guys behind Jamie Shipley and Charlie Geller) found the trade of a lifetime, they couldn't actually execute it. Wall Street wouldn't talk to them. They were too small. They didn't have an ISDA agreement, which is basically the "hunting license" you need to trade complex derivatives with big banks.
That is where Hockett came in. He brought the credibility. He brought the access. Without him, Cornwall Capital would have been stuck on the sidelines watching the world burn without a dime to show for it.
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Hockett was a "collapsenik." This isn't just a movie trope. He genuinely believed that the complexity of the financial system was a ticking time bomb. In Michael Lewis’s book, there’s a great detail about how Hockett lived in a house on a fault line. When he realized how fragile the economy was, he didn't just trade against it. He sold his house. He was convinced that if the banks went down, the electricity might go too.
What the Movie Got Right (and Wrong)
Hollywood loves a hero, and Brad Pitt played Rickert as a sort of reluctant Jedi. The "don't dance" scene is legendary. It’s the moment where the audience is reminded that a 489% return on investment means millions of people losing their homes and pensions.
- The Pub Scene: This actually happened. Hockett was on vacation in Devon, England, at a place called the Powder Monkey pub. He had to use their Wi-Fi to offload the swaps because Bear Stearns was collapsing in real-time. If he didn't sell those positions immediately, the contracts would have been worthless because the counterparty (the bank) would have been bankrupt.
- The Gardening: Yes, he was a prepper. Hockett moved his family to a remote area north of San Francisco. He planted fruit and vegetables to be self-sufficient. He wasn't just being "quirky" for the cameras; he was deeply, fundamentally terrified of a systemic collapse.
- The Relationship: In the movie, it looks like he barely knows the two kids. In reality, Hockett was a partner. He was the head trader and Chief Risk Officer at Cornwall. It wasn't a casual mentorship; it was a business partnership built on a shared suspicion that the world had gone mad.
Why Ben Rickert Still Matters Today
It's been years since the 2008 crash. You’d think we’d have learned. But looking at the story of Ben Rickert in The Big Short is a reminder of "tail risk." That's the stuff that isn't supposed to happen but does.
Hockett’s genius wasn't just in seeing the bubble. It was in understanding the asymmetry of the bet. They weren't betting that the housing market would definitely crash. They were betting that the cost of the bet was so low compared to the potential payout that it was mathematically stupid not to take it.
The banks were selling insurance on double-A rated bonds for pennies because they thought those bonds were "safe." Hockett and the Cornwall team realized that if the subprime stuff at the bottom failed, the whole tower would fall. They bought the insurance cheap. When the tower fell, the insurance paid out 80 to 1.
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Where is the Real Ben Rickert Now?
Ben Hockett hasn't spent the last decade doing press tours. He’s stayed remarkably quiet, which fits the character perfectly. He remained at Cornwall Capital for years, continuing to hunt for those "black swan" events where the market misprices the probability of a disaster.
He still lives largely off the grid. Reports suggest he maintains that property you can't even get to by car. It’s a level of commitment to a worldview that you have to respect, even if you think he's a bit paranoid. He didn't just profit from the crisis; he let it change how he lived his life.
Lessons from the Big Short Trade
If you're trying to apply the "Ben Rickert" philosophy to your own life or investments, keep these points in mind:
- Complexity is a mask. When someone tells you a financial product is too complicated to explain, they usually mean they don't want you to know how much risk is inside it.
- Watch the counterparty. It doesn't matter if you're right if the person who owes you money goes broke. Hockett’s frantic trading in that English pub was all about "counterparty risk."
- Check your ego. Hockett didn't want to be famous. He wanted to be right, and he wanted to be safe. Most people lose money because they want to look smart.
- Asymmetry is king. Look for situations where the downside is capped (like the small premiums Cornwall paid) but the upside is nearly infinite.
The story of Ben Rickert is basically a cautionary tale wrapped in a success story. It reminds us that while the "smartest guys in the room" are usually the ones causing the mess, the guy growing carrots in a remote forest might be the one who actually knows what’s going on.
If you want to dive deeper into the mechanics of how they actually spotted the flaw in the CDOs, your next step should be to look into the "Double-A Tranche" trade. It’s the specific piece of the puzzle that Cornwall Capital exploited, and it’s arguably the most brilliant technical move in the entire book.