Clint Carlson opened the doors to his Dallas-based Carlson Capital in 1993, after spending years cutting his teeth as the head of risk arbitrage for the investment arm of the Texas-based Bass Brothers. The firm uses a multi-strategy approach to investing, borrowing from risk arbitrage, convertible arbitrage, relative value arbitrage (mostly pairs trading), event-driven arbitrage, distressed/credit arbitrage and traditional long/short strategies. The fund bases its investment decisions on three pillars - philosophy, people and process. It may sound a little touchy-feely, but it is really just a fancy way of saying that Clint Carlson isn't afraid to go against the grain. Rather than listen to opinions, Clint Carlson prefers to look at a company's philosophy, the people who run it and the way they do things - an investment style that does well in the relative isolation from the financial world that Texas supplies.

"You're not caught up in the groupthink as much," says Carlson. "You're not constantly bombarded with other people's opinions." Clint Carlson currently has over $6 billion in assets under management, the majority of which is managed under the Black Diamond and Double Black Diamond funds.