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High Wall Road block dealer Andrew Liebeskind has left hedge fund LMR Companions after lower than a yr and is becoming a member of rival ExodusPoint Capital Administration, in line with individuals with information of the strikes.
Liebeskind had joined LMR in New York on the finish of December final yr to steer its fairness capital markets division.
He has now departed the $11bn multi-strategy hedge fund and can begin at ExodusPoint in February as world head of fairness capital markets, in line with an individual briefed on the appointment. He’ll stay in New York and report back to the $11bn hedge fund’s co-founder and chief govt officer, Michael Gelband.
Liebeskind was beforehand head of main methods at Surveyor Capital, an fairness investing a part of Ken Griffin’s Citadel, the world’s best-performing hedge fund.
LMR declined to remark. ExodusPoint declined to touch upon the rent, which was first reported by Bloomberg. Liebeskind didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Block buying and selling is a profitable nook of fairness markets, during which banks public sale massive stakes in listed firms on behalf of shareholders. It’s extremely relationship pushed: funding banks sometimes search to gauge demand for potential offers earlier than they’ve been made public, whereas not divulging personal data to hedge fund shoppers.
Liebeskind was one in every of a bunch of distinguished hedge fund merchants whose communications had been sought by US authorities as a part of a Securities and Trade Fee probe into block buying and selling practices, in line with two individuals with direct information of a subpoena issued in 2021.
The truth that Liebeskind’s communications had been sought by US authorities as a part of the probe was public information when LMR employed him. Liebeskind was not accused of any wrongdoing.
As a part of this investigation, the SEC charged Morgan Stanley’s former head of the financial institution’s US fairness syndicate, Pawan Passi, with fraud. The financial institution entered right into a non-prosecution settlement with the US lawyer’s workplace in Manhattan, paying a $249mn penalty earlier this yr to settle civil and legal costs.
Passi admitted to misconduct and agreed a deferred prosecution settlement with the US lawyer. US authorities finally discovered no wrongdoing past Morgan Stanley and Passi.
LMR was based in 2009 by Ben Levine, Andrew Manuel and Stefan Renold. They acquired seed capital from Donald Sussman’s Paloma Companions. Manuel left in 2015.
In 2018 Goldman Sachs’ Petershill Companions, which buys minority stakes in various asset managers, purchased a stake in LMR. Final month Petershill introduced it had bought its complete LMR stake again to the agency’s management workforce for a complete consideration of as much as $258mn.
LMR employs greater than 300 individuals in workplaces in London, Hong Kong, New York, Zurich, Glasgow, Dubai and Dublin. It adopts a market-neutral method to buying and selling systematic and discretionary methods, throughout a variety of markets together with equities, fastened revenue and commodities.
This story was amended to make clear that Liebeskind’s communications had been sought by US authorities.