Carson Block

Carson Cutler Block (born April 27, 1977) is an American investor and activist short-seller, best known as the founder of Muddy Waters Research and Muddy Waters Capital, an investment research firm and hedge fund. His work has included high-profile campaigns on publicly traded companies in North America, Europe, and Asia.

Block first gained wide attention in 2011 for reporting on irregularities at Sino‑Forest, a Toronto‑listed Chinese forestry company that later entered Canadian bankruptcy protection. He was named to Bloomberg Markets ' "50 Most Influential" list in 2011. He has also appeared in the 2017 documentary The China Hustle and co‑authored Doing Business in China For Dummies (2007).

Early life and education

Block was born in New York City and grew up in Summit, New Jersey. There, Block studied Chinese and Business (focusing on Finance). He moved to China after college, in 1998.

Block later returned to the United States, and worked in investment banking for nine months in 1999 for the Los Angeles office of CIBC World Markets. He then went to work with his father during 1999 to 2002, a period he describes as “very embittering” as he was “lied to by a parade of management” of internet companies. He quit equity analysis for law school.

Career

After graduating from law school, Block moved back to Shanghai, China, and worked in mergers and acquisitions and foreign direct investment for law firm Jones Day from 2005 until 2006.

He targeted Chinese forest plantation operator company Sino-Forest in 2011, accusing it of overstating its timber holdings.

In 2011, Block was ranked as a 50 Most Influential Thinker by Bloomberg Markets.

Block was featured in the 2015 book by Richard Teitelbaum entitled The Most Dangerous Trade: How Short Sellers Uncover Fraud, Keep Markets Honest, and Make and Lose Billions. In September 2017, he initiated a private lawsuit against Equifax, accusing it of neglecting to safeguard his personally identifiable information. He appears in the 2017 financial documentary The China Hustle, outlining his research into securities fraud of Chinese companies through Muddy Waters. In early 2018, he settled a case with St. Jude Medical Inc.

As of April 2021, eight of the companies that Block had exposed as being fraudulent had been delisted from stock exchanges, and two other such companies had settled charges with their regulators. Over the prior five years, Muddy Waters had annualized returns of 19% (after a management fee (2.5%) and a performance fee (30%)). He called the work by Mitts "a non-empirical, conflict-laden polemic based on misrepresentation, selective presentation of data, and lack of academic integrity.

In 2024, U.S. authorities closed both civil and criminal probes into Block’s activities without action.