Most people don’t know that Warren Buffett used leverage to produce huge returns in the early 1950s. Buffett used leverage on what he used to call Jewish Treasury Bills, which is what he learned from his mentor Benjamin Graham. A Jewish Treasury Bill is a low-risk strategy involving special situation investments such as merger arbitrage or liquidation events. These low-risk investments made Buffett tons of money in the 1950s. A study of Warren Buffett’s trades from 1970-2003 showed that Buffett's special situation trades produced annualized returns of 39.3%.