Does anyone know when the term vulture funds started to get used? First reference I can find is at some point in negotiations between Argentina and hedge fund creditors a few years back

— Kate Aronoff (@KateAronoff) March 1, 2018

I don’t know first use, but I started hearing the term “vulture fund” and the related “vulture capitalist(s)” during the 1990s, and possibly in the 1980s but I was not paying as much attention then.

However, the earliest historical reference I can find is from 1964, in The Bankers Magazine, Volume 174.

That the term is used without quotes in a stodgy magazine like that (though it has an explanation) implies it was already in relatively-wide usage well before that.

If I had to guess, though I could not find any earlier evidence, I’d say that it probably originated in the 1930s informally.