This hedge fund has been hiring traders from UBS, Deutsche Bank and J.P. Morgan

A $5bn hedge fund that focuses on the derivatives market has quietly been tapping the trading floors of large investment banks for its London operation.

During the past two months, Capstone Investment Advisors, which has around 110 staff globally, has hired former UBS, Deutsche Bank and J.P. Morgan traders for its London office in Mayfair.

Cherie Xiu Zhou, a vice president trading US dollar exotics within Deutsche Bank’s rates and credit team, has just joined Capstone as a trader. She spent four years at the German bank, having joined from UBS where she worked as a FICC strategist.

She follows Nathaniel Amos, a trader at UBS in London who joined Capstone as a junior portfolio manager in August, and Andrei Boros, who spent two years as an equity derivatives trader at J.P. Morgan. For the past seven years, Boros has been an options trader at CapeView Capital, and joined Capstone as a partner and portfolio manager in September. Mark McLornan, a former J.P. Morgan portfolio manager who was latterly a macro PM at hedge fund Eurizon SLJ Capital, also joined in October.

Capstone’s recent hiring spree in London follows a successful 2016. Accounts for its UK operation, released in late September on Companies House, show that it made £12m in profits last year, up from £6.9m in 2015.

It paid its 24 London employees £3.8m in 2016, up from £2.3m the previous year, or an average payment of £158.3k. However, these figures may hide more generous packages elsewhere – in a separate Pillar 3 report it said that it paid an undisclosed number of code staff £14.2m last year. It also said that the highest paid member received £6.8m.

Aside from London, Capstone has another European office in Amsterdam and has also been making some senior hires there – although they’ve largely been lifted out of rival firm Blenheim Capital Management. Gerlof vde Vrij, managing partner, Pieter Jelle van der Sluis, head of systematic strategies Michél Pancras, senior portfolio manager and Roy Hoevenaars, portfolio manager all joined in July.

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