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The Systematica Investments founder talks about the need to constantly refine investment models to meet the needs of investors.
2. Leda Braga
Systematica Investments
Systematica Investments CEO Leda Braga has always enjoyed solving thorny problems. As a quantitative analyst on the derivatives research team at J.P. Morgan in London during the mid- to late '90s, the Brazilian-born Braga built sophisticated models to price exotic interest rate products and hybrid instruments. In 2001 she was recruited by BlueCrest Capital Management co-founders Michael Platt and William Reeves to create pricing tools and analytics while looking for new trading opportunities. It was there that Braga, a self-described geek who has a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Imperial College London, came up with the idea for BlueTrend, a systematic, trend-following hedge fund launched by BlueCrest in April 2004. The fund, which trades futures in more than 150 markets around the world, has delivered an annualized return of 12 percent and has had only one down year, 2013.
Late last year BlueCrest spun out Braga's group of 100 traders, researchers and technologists as Systematica. Although BlueCrest retains a significant economic interest in the new firm and its existing funds, BlueTrend and BlueMatrix, 49-year-old Braga is majority owner of the Geneva-based operation. Innovation will be important for her as she plots the course for $9.2 billion- in-assets Systematica, which also has offices in Jersey, London, New York and Singapore. Her team must continue to refine its quantitative investment models, as well as design lower-fee products with greater transparency to meet the demands of current and future hedge fund investors.
Institutional Investor's Alpha: When you were growing up, did you have any intention of going into finance?
Braga: No, not at all. I started a career in academia. I was a lecturer at Imperial College between 1990 and 1993. It was going well. I had research contracts, I was supervising Ph.D. students, and I was teaching a lot. The problem was that it was the Thatcher years in the U.K. You could get funding, but it was hard work, and at the same time there was this whole City of London phenomenon happening around us. Then you really ask what it is to be an engineer. If you are a pure...