Billionaire hedge fund manager Cliff Asness tore into New York City mayoral frontrunner Zohran Mamdani’s rent-freeze proposal, warning it would devastate the city’s housing market. The outspoken financier didn’t mince words when describing the impact of Mamdani’s plan to prohibit rent increases on rent-stabilized apartments.
“Rent control is one of the few issues almost all economists agree destroys the city. So let’s triple down. Genius,” Asness told The New York Post on Tuesday, his sarcasm highlighting his belief that the policy would cripple the market.
He went on to draw a grim comparison to past housing restrictions. “A rent freeze is the hydrogen bomb to the atomic bomb of regular rent controls,” he said, describing the plan as an extreme escalation of already damaging regulation.
Asness, 59, who is Jewish and has been an outspoken critic of Mamdani’s far-left views, also ridiculed the assemblyman’s failure to condemn Hamas and his embrace of the slogan “globalize the intifada.” “Come for the communism, stay for the globalizing of the intifada. Shrewd, New York City,” Asness quipped. “I wish I lived in NYC so I could join those moving out to Texas or Florida if he wins.”
The AQR Capital Management founder has a long record of pushing back against antisemitism and anti-Israel rhetoric. After the October 7 attacks and the subsequent war in Gaza, Asness condemned Mamdani’s comments on Israel, and in 2023, he halted donations to the University of Pennsylvania after it hosted what he called an “antisemitic Burning Man fest.”
Asness, who launched his quantitative hedge fund in Manhattan in 1998 before relocating to Greenwich, Connecticut in 2004, now oversees $165 billion in assets. His remarks echoed those of other major figures in finance who view Mamdani’s economic ideas as reckless.
Fortress Investment Group co-CEO Drew McKnight previously warned that Mamdani’s housing platform would devastate New York’s property market. “You’ll just make it impossible to have new supply. Unfortunately, it could do damage to the people he’s trying to help,” McKnight told The Post in an earlier interview.
The warnings come as the mayoral race tightens. A new poll released Monday showed Mamdani barely ahead, holding 43.9% support to independent Andrew Cuomo’s 39.4%, with Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa far behind at 15.5%.
Critics note that Mamdani himself personally benefits from rent stabilization. Despite earning $143,000 a year as a state legislator, he lives with his wife in a rent-stabilized one-bedroom apartment in Astoria, Queens, paying just $2,300 per month.
The city’s rent stabilization system governs about one million apartments, limiting annual rent increases as determined by a mayor-appointed board. While designed to help low- and middle-income tenants, many wealthier residents also occupy the below-market units.
Wall Street insiders have been increasingly uneasy about Mamdani’s economic agenda, fearing his victory could trigger major disruption to New York’s financial ecosystem. Several firms have reportedly discussed moving operations to Dallas to avoid potential new taxes championed by left-wing policymakers.
Back in July, a meeting between Mamdani and top finance executives arranged by business leader Kathryn Wylde fell apart when several CEOs, including JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon, refused to attend — a sign of the growing rift between New York’s financial establishment and its possible next mayor.
