Millennium Capital Partners quietly added a lot of people in London

If you've been looking for a hedge fund job in London in 2019, you should probably have tried Millennium Capital Partners. The U.S.-based fund, quietly engaged in some considerable hiring in the first nine months of this year. 

Figures from the UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) show that Millennium increased its headcount of approved persons in London from 151 in January 2019 to 182 in October. - A 20% rise in a ten month period. 

Millennium didn't respond to a request to comment on the increase, but it seems a deliberate decision was made to boost the fund's London presence in late 2018, with much of the addition happening between January and June of this year. 

Approved persons are typically traders, portfolio managers or risk and compliance professionals. Millennium's London hires earlier in the year included Farzad Kassam, the former co-head of GBP rates trading at NatWest Markets, who joined in June, and Sachin Goel, who joined in February from RBC. 

New people are still arriving. Chris Miller (who was last seen at Morgan Stanley in 2016) joined this month, as did Anton Dindio, who was previously with Millennium in New York. In July, Millennium hired Hugo Dubois, Deutsche's former head of euro inflation trading. 

Millennium Management had $38bn under management globally in June 2019 according to information provider Preqin. Bloomberg reported yesterday that Millennium's main U.S. fund fell 0.5% in September as most big funds were blindsided by a difficult start to the month.

Portfolio managers often like working for Millennium because they are given considerable freedom to operate under the fund's umbrella and are paid on the performance of their particular team, rather than the net gains of the entire fund. In 2018, average compensation at Millennium in London was £543k ($660k) each for partners and £330k ($401k) each for everyone else. 

Historically, Millennium had a reputation for hiring people in and spitting them out again if they didn't perform. In 2019, however, this doesn't seem to have happened. So far, just five people have left Millennium without moving to a new registered role in London according to the FCA Register. None at all have gone to rival firms. 

One headhunter who works with hedge funds said that "of course" Millennium has been hiring. "It's what they do," he said. "If you're any good, they'll always give you a try."

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