Hedge Fund Alert: 5/7/25 “More Hedge Fund Professionals Finding Second Act at Executive Search Firms”

Capitalizing on an insider’s view of the industry, hedge fund professionals are increasingly migrating to recruiting roles at dedicated executive-search firms, a longtime headhunter says.

And anecdotal evidence suggests he’s onto something, with several newer firms – both recently launched or a couple of years old – stressing to clients that they’re staffed by people who have experience in the jobs they’re looking to fill.

While search firms have long sought out industry professionals to bolster their ranks, Carrington Fox partner Shaun Kinsley said his firm increasingly is receiving inbound requests from the likes of operations, business development and investment pros who want to make a change in their careers while drawing on their experience and expertise.

Those staffers might be feeling burned out or might be seeking more control over their careers and transparency into their compensation, Kinsley said.

“This trend is driven by professionals from banks and hedge funds who bring a consultative mindset and deep knowledge of products and strategy,” he said. “Burnout is common, fueled by rising competition, volatile markets and relentless risk management.

“Headhunting offers a solid pivot – especially for those with strong networks and a knack for making connections.” Carrington Fox, a New York operation that has been recruiting for the financial industry since 2001, has hired at least five staffers with backgrounds at hedge fund firms or banks in the past few years.

The most recent addition, Brian Yelvington, arrived last month. Yelvington, whose experience stretches back to Lehman Brothers in the early 2000s, had been a portfolio manager at Millennium Management and First New York, with an additional five-year stop as a macro investor at Louis Bacon’s Moore Capital, before moving into a manager-selection post at Brevan Howard Asset Management.

Yelvington’s hire followed the March pickup of Ian DeLisio, who joined Carrington Fox from investment bank Citizens JMP, where he was director of institutional equity sales and trading.

One new recruiting shop makes its pitch overt.

“Insiders, Not Recruiters,” Firsthand Talent Partners announces in large type atop its website.

Former business-development executive Curtis Krause launched the Old Greenwich, Conn., operation in April to scout for client-facing roles in sales, investorrelations, consultant-relations and product departments.

Krause said that in his own experiences across two decades, he’s found that hedge fund recruiters typically haven’t worked at hedge fund firms and sometimes lack the detailed knowledge required to meet the needs of high-powered investment shops. As a former fundraiser, he said, he has a strong understanding of what kind of rainmaker works best in a specific environment.

A co-founder of materials science startup NanoClear Technologies, Krause has spent time on both the buyside – working as a fundraiser at AQR Capital and First Quadrant – and the sellside, including a stint at Goldman Sachs. He previously was general partner and head of investor relations at early-stage venture capital firm TechOperators, head of global institutional sales and marketing at Causeway Capital and a business-development staffer at Muzinich & Co.

Another newly launched firm, Cross Atlantic Partners, is co-helmed by a former top technology executive at Balyasny Asset Management. Ed Wasilewski – who had been chief operating officer for technology at the Chicago multi-strategy firm until March of last year, when he began sitting out a non-compete term – teamed up with longtime recruiter John Meyers in December on Miami-based Cross Atlantic, which focuses on technology hires at hedge funds and banks.

Wasilewski’s seven-year stretch at Balyasny was preceded by time as director of market intelligence technology at Point72 Asset Management. He also served in a technology role at Point72 predecessor SAC Capital.

Atlas Search in 2023 tapped Anthony Rodriguez, a former BlueCrest Capital equity trader and Goldman Sachs macro sales trader, to expand the New York operation’s global-markets business and its placement of portfolio managers, analysts, traders and quantitative specialists. Hires on Atlas’ global-markets team as part of that effort also included Michael Hillebrecht, previously an investment-banking analyst at BMO Capital Markets.

At New York-based Finer Recruiting, formed in late 2022, senior staffers had tenures at Weeden & Co., Jones Trading, Guggenheim Partners, Salomon Smith Barney and Credit Suisse.

“Our partners and senior leaders are former Wall Street executives who have had full, lucrative careers in finance. As a result, we are acutely aware of what employers want, and we know precisely which employees will be successful,” said founder Brett Finer, who previously served as head of U.S. outsourced trading at Jefferies. “This allows us to take a ‘rifle shot’ approach to recruiting as opposed to a ‘tommy gun,’ dramatically reducing PM/COO/hiring manager time spent on the entire recruiting process.”

Not every hedge fund professional is cut out for headhunting. An executive at one search firm that hires from the industry noted that portfolio managers, while highly attuned to what makes people successful in those roles, are typically accustomed to receiving pitches as opposed to giving them and, as such, don’t necessarily have the temperament for frequent rejections.

Kinsley, the Carrington Fox partner, agrees that not everyone is a natural fit. Those who are, however, are strong communicators and skilled at connecting people, he said.

In addition, he said, the right hire with deep industry knowledge and a wide network can catapult a recruiting operation into a sector or an asset class it hadn’t otherwise covered, as Carrington Fox experienced with the 2021 addition of J.P. McNichol, whose background included a long stretch as a commodities marketer, giving the search firm a foothold in the space.

McNichol had been a capital-markets consultant at Southlake Ventures before joining Carrington Fox. Earlier, he was chief operating officer at Cogent Energy Investment and held positions at FSM Capital, Ponus Capital and Gridiron Trading Management.

In 2023, Carrington Fox brought on David Li, who had previously traded commodities at Goldman Sachs. A 2022 hire, Kieron Keating, spent nine years as Morgan Stanley’s global chief operating officer for senior relationship management for institutional clients. Keating previously headed up operations for Jefferies’ fixed-income division and Barclays’ securitized-product group