UBS's critical quant joined hedge fund Millennium

Central risk book (CRB) teams in banking have historically been divisive. In some cases, they're small teams of ultra-powerful quants taking proprietary risk with the bank's own balance sheet; in others, they're not-so-glorified algorithmic execution teams. It's not clear which category Richard Moore fell into at UBS, but he's now off to a hedge fund.

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Moore was UBS's head of its central risk book in EMEA. He's just joined Millennium in London as a quant trader. He spent 15 years at UBS and became head of the central risk book in 2020, which was presumably an interesting experience given that he was in the role when Credit Suisse went down in 2023.

The CRB team at UBS is led by Srichakri Adhikarapatti. He was made MD in 2023 as head of FX and cash equities principal quant trading and was handed the additional responsibility of running the CRB just six months later. London based MD Zain Nizami, a 25-year UBS lifer, oversees CRB risk.

Moore isn't the only CRB guy to join a hedge fund. JPMorgan's ex-CRB head Marco Dion is currently head of research at quant hedge fund Qube Research, while BofA's CRB technology head Rahul Mundke is a quant research and development lead at the UAE sovereign wealth fund ADIA.

CRB teams are often victims of internal politics because they can take responsibility away from other trading teams. At the extreme end, these teams have been described as "more dramatic than the White House," although it would be hard to argue that case in 2025.

UBS declined to comment.

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