Skip to content
The Twenty Minute VCThe Twenty Minute VC

Billy Hult: 27 Years of Compounding Growth Leading to the Market Leader with $1.4BN in Revenue|E1134

Billy Hult is Chief Executive Officer of Tradeweb Markets (Nasdaq: TW), as Billy puts it, they are the “electronic interface that connects Citadel and Goldman”. They are also one of the most under the radar but incredible businesses of the last 20 years. Through no glitz acquisitions or specific moments, TradeWeb has compounded organic growth for the last 27 years to today, with a market cap of $22BN. ----------------------------------------------- Timestamps: (0:00) Intro (01:03) Billy’s Career Journey (06:22) The Path to CEO (12:30) Leadership and Management Insights (20:15) Cultivating a Talent Brand (23:53) Strategy in Positioning and Branding (31:35) Work-Life Harmony (34:09) Parenting with Ambition (37:37) Valuing Money, Fame, and Power (38:28) Wealth’s Influence on Leadership (41:19) Public Company Pros and Cons (42:49) Stock Performance and Well-being (43:54) Betting on People as a Leader (49:53) Young Generation Work Ethic (54:28) Balancing Hiring Strategies (56:12) Financial Market Challenges (Assigned to Luca) (59:23) Quick-Fire Questions ----------------------------------------------- In Today’s Episode with Billy Hult: 1. From Betting Shop Worker to Public Company CEO: How would Billy’s teachers and parents have described the young Billy? Why does Billy think it is so important to have a hard first job when growing up? What does Billy know now that he wishes he had known when he started? 2. What it Takes to be a World-Leading CEO: How does Billy define the role of the CEO? What are the core tenets? What has been the single hardest element of CEOship to learn? Does Billy care about being liked? How does that impact his management style? Why does Billy think it is so important for CEOs to make “big bets”? What have been his biggest? 3. Hiring World-Class Teams in 2024: What have been some of Billy’s biggest hiring mistakes? What did he learn from them? How does Billy weigh IQ vs EQ and hustle? Which wins? Why? Does Billy think this generation of millennials is too soft? What are the single biggest lessons Billy has on when to delegate vs when to retain control? 4. Money, Power and Family: How does Billy approach his relationship to money today? How has it changed over time? Fame, power or money, rank them from 1-3. How does Billy rank them? How does Billy describe his own style of parenting? How has it changed over time? ----------------------------------------------- Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3j2KMcZTtgTNBKwtZBMHvl?si=85bc9196860e4466 Subscribe on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-twenty-minute-vc-20vc-venture-capital-startup/id958230465 Follow Harry Stebbings on Twitter: https://twitter.com/HarryStebbings Follow Tradeweb on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Tradeweb Follow 20VC on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/20vchq Follow 20VC on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@20vc_tok Visit our Website: https://www.20vc.com Subscribe to our Newsletter: https://www.thetwentyminutevc.com/contact ----------------------------------------------- #20vc #harrystebbings #billyhult #tradeweb #ceo #venturecapital #businesstips #investing #businessstrategy

Billy HultguestHarry Stebbingshost
Mar 28, 20241h 5mWatch on YouTube ↗

At a glance

WHAT IT’S REALLY ABOUT

Billy Hult on ego, grit, and scaling Tradeweb into a giant

  1. Billy Hult, CEO of Tradeweb, reflects on his trajectory from a gritty first job in a Bronx betting shop to running a $1.4B‑revenue public markets platform. He emphasizes that success is far more about resilience, street smarts, and emotional engagement than pedigree or polish. The conversation dives into what makes an effective CEO, how to balance ego with authenticity, how to bet on people, and how to lead a high‑performing culture without fear. Hult also explores parenting in a wealthy family, generational work ethic, navigating trauma and macro shocks, and the dangers of complacency as Tradeweb scales globally.

IDEAS WORTH REMEMBERING

5 ideas

Lean into what emotionally engages you, not just abstract ‘passion’.

Hult thrived only when he genuinely cared about a subject; he argues that people do their best work where interest, aptitude, and emotional engagement intersect—‘follow your passion’ without realism is naive, but ignoring engagement is equally dangerous.

A CEO must be both strategist and operator, not just a figurehead.

He sees the CEO’s job as setting clear strategic direction, being the external face of the company, and staying close enough to execution to avoid passivity—‘hire great people and get out of the way’ is incomplete without active support and high standards.

Ego is necessary fuel, but it has to be owned and managed.

Hult openly acknowledges his ego—wanting visibility, credit, and partnership status—but stresses that authenticity and perspective (recognizing you’re not ‘storming the beach at Normandy’) keep ego from becoming corrosive.

Big bets on people are indispensable—and half of them will be wrong.

He has made ‘big bets’ by hiring and elevating people and board members who weren’t obvious choices; despite strong intuition, he estimates only ~50% work out, with chemistry, misaligned ambition, and unclear feedback as common failure modes.

Time and boundaries are critical assets for a public-company CEO.

Looking back, he wishes he had created firmer boundaries earlier: not taking every meeting, not entertaining every relationship, and rigorously protecting time so he can focus on high‑leverage investor, client, and strategic work.

WORDS WORTH SAVING

5 quotes

It's not about pedigree. It's not about polishedness. It's about old-fashioned grit and resiliency and street smarts.

— Billy Hult

When people show you who they are, believe them.

— Billy Hult, quoting Maya Angelou and applying it to leadership

I don't always get what I want, but I tend to get what I want a fair amount.

— Billy Hult

Prospering below the radar is kind of cool.

— Billy Hult

The company’s going to be bigger, stronger, and a better company… Complacency is the killer of the whole thing.

— Billy Hult

Early life, non-linear education, and formative ‘hard’ first jobsPhilosophy of leadership and the CEO’s core responsibilitiesBalancing ego, authenticity, and the desire to be likedHiring, betting on people, and the realities of a ~50% hit rateWork ethic, generational differences, and cultural expectations around grindParenting, privilege, and instilling hunger in kidsPublic company life, market pressure, and geopolitical uncertainty

High quality AI-generated summary created from speaker-labeled transcript.

Get more out of YouTube videos.

High quality summaries for YouTube videos. Accurate transcripts to search & find moments. Powered by ChatGPT & Claude AI.

Add to Chrome