Daniel Och

Daniel S. Och at the World Economic Forum

Daniel S. Och is an American billionaire investor and philanthropist renowned for founding Och-Ziff Capital Management in 1994, which evolved into a leading global alternative asset manager overseeing tens of billions in assets before rebranding as Sculptor Capital Management following his 2019 departure amid client outflows, subpar returns, and fallout from international bribery investigations.

Och began his career at Goldman Sachs in 1982 within the risk arbitrage department, advancing over more than a decade to head proprietary trading in the equities division, honing expertise in merger arbitrage and convertible securities that informed his subsequent hedge fund strategies. With initial backing from the Ziff family, he launched Och-Ziff as a multistrategy firm emphasizing risk arbitrage, credit, and real estate, achieving peak assets under management exceeding $50 billion by the mid-2010s through consistent performance and institutional allocations.

The firm's trajectory was marred by a U.S. Department of Justice settlement exceeding $400 million for admitting involvement in African bribery schemes, including payments to secure mining investments in Libya and South Africa, which implicated senior leadership and eroded investor confidence, culminating in Och's exit as CEO and chairman. Post-departure, Och established Willoughby Capital, a family office deploying capital into venture-backed firms such as Robinhood, Coinbase, and Instacart, while maintaining a net worth estimated at $4.2 billion as of 2025.

Alongside his wife Jane, Och has channeled substantial resources into philanthropy via the Jane and Daniel Och Family Foundation, disbursing over $500 million to initiatives in public health, medical research—including a $50 million endowment for Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center's patient facilities—Jewish education, arts, and poverty alleviation through organizations like the Robin Hood Foundation.