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Hedge fund teams Citadel and Millennium have been outshone by smaller rivals to this point this 12 months, because the companies had been stung by the market volatility unleashed by Donald Trump’s commerce warfare.
Citadel’s flagship Wellington fund gained 2.5 per cent within the first half of 2025 whereas Millennium gained 2.2 per cent, in line with individuals acquainted with the matter. Balyasny and ExodusPoint had been up 7.3 per cent and 9.3 per cent respectively, in line with individuals who have seen the figures.
Ken Griffin’s Citadel and Izzy Englander’s Millennium, which handle about $66bn and $75bn respectively, are the dominant gamers amongst so-called multi-manager funds, a sector that has sucked in billions of {dollars} from the world’s largest buyers.
Multi-manager companies, which additionally embrace $25bn Balyasny and $11bn ExodusPoint, have legions of buying and selling groups often known as “pods”, which commerce quite a lot of methods in asset lessons together with equities, mounted earnings and commodities. They borrow giant sums from banks to juice returns and cling to strict threat administration to regulate losses, making them engaging to huge buyers comparable to pension funds that need steady returns.
As pioneers of the mannequin, Millennium and Citadel have been catapulted to the very prime of the hedge fund trade over the previous decade.
Multi-managers are fuelled by so-called “pass-through” charges, which contain charging all bills, together with workplace rents, know-how and information, bonuses and shopper leisure, on to buyers. It is a departure from the everyday hedge fund mannequin, which traditionally charged a 2 per cent administration price on belongings.
Citadel was wrongfooted by Trump’s tariff insurance policies earlier this 12 months, with Griffin telling The Economist in Could that the agency needed to “tear aside and re-examine the portfolio . . . and ask your self in what methods we’ve positioned or mis-positioned ourselves in opposition to the fact that the percentages of a recession have gone greater”.
Final 12 months, Citadel and Millennium eclipsed most rivals as they delivered 15 per cent to buyers. Citadel’s annualised web return because the agency was based 35 years in the past is roughly 19.2 per cent.
Griffin, a significant Republican donor, has turn out to be one among Trump’s most outspoken critics, saying final 12 months that the president’s tariff plans would put the US “on a slippery slope to crony capitalism”.
In the meantime, the flagship Apex technique of billionaire Cliff Asness’s quant fund AQR was up 11.4 per cent within the first half of the 12 months, in line with an individual acquainted with the numbers. Bridgewater Associates, the macro hedge fund based by billionaire Ray Dalio, additionally had a powerful first half of the 12 months with its Pure Alpha fund returning 17 per cent.
