Hedge fund QRT interviewed heavily for its discretionary macro team. Now it's made a decision
Qube Research and Technologies (QRT) has been diversifying. When it spun out of Credit Suisse in 2018, it was focused on systematic equities. Since then, it's moved into fundamental equities under Stephen Irvine, commodities under Naveen Arora, and catastrophe bonds under Raphael Rayees.
Now it's also diversifying into discretionary macro trading, and has made a significant hire.
Qube declined to comment for this article, but we understand from multiple sources that a head of discretionary macro trading has been appointed and will join soon. Thereafter, he or she is expected to build a team.
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Macro portfolio managers say Qube was interviewing heavily for the role and that various people got the call. The identity of the successful individual remains unclear. If you know, please clarify it immediately using the contact details at the bottom of this article.
Qube is very French. It is also very unorthodox. People who have worked there in the past told us they have limited visibility on personal PnL and that portfolio managers don't run individual books. Instead, they are expected to provide trading strategies that are coded into Qube's systems and then receive allocations of money from Qube's central fund depending upon performance. The people providing strategies aren't always aware how much their strategy was allocated, or how it performed. Sometimes one strategy is combined with another, further obscuring things.
For portfolio managers used to receive a percentage of personal PnL as compensation, this be unnerving. Bonuses are discretionary and up to 75% must be invested in Qube's own funds for a period of years.
This approach has enabled Qube to keep compensation costs low and to keep hiring. When it spun out of Credit Suisse in 2018, Qube employed 100 people. Now it employs well over 2,000 people and is adding more.
Most of Qube's hires are technologists or quants, though. Macro portfolio managers are rarer sorts of beasts. Not all macro PMs will be attracted by Qube's set-up. But someone has been.
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