Jim Simons, the mathematician-investor who created what many in finance consider the world’s greatest moneymaking machine, has died. : Jim Simons, the mathematician-investor who created what many in finance consider the world’s greatest moneymaking machine at his secretive firm, Renaissance Technologies, has died. He was 86. In turning from academia to investing as he entered his 40s, Simons eschewed standard practices of money managers in favor of quantitative analysis — finding patterns in data that predicted price changes. His technique was so successful that he became known as the Quant King.