Hedge funds are lining up inhouse recruiters for a big 2026

If Goldman Sachs is right, 2026 will be another big year for hedge fund hiring. This year, it found that a net 45% of asset allocators plan to increase hedge fund exposure - the highest level ever for the survey since 2017. 

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More assets usually mean more portfolio managers and more support staff. This may explain why some hedge funds have started this year by adding the sorts of business development staff that help them find new talent.

Schonfeld, for example, has just onboarded BlueCrest's global head of business development, Michael Grad, in New York City. Grad is not joining as a bus dev guy specifically but as the 'chief investment initiatives officer', which could conceivably include investing in human beings.

Citadel, which Business Insider says lost seven business development professionals last year, had replenished its ranks with Justas Povilenas, a former recruiter who's just arrived in London to focused on hiring in fixed income, and with Alana Althens, who arrived from Moody's in New York to focus on adding talent in equity quant research.

And Brevan Howard, which has had some turnover in its technology team has hired quant recruiter Rhydian Lawrence to work in business development in London, as well as Oscar Willett who previously spent 17 years at search firm the Omerta Group. 

The inflow of business development professionals is not the only positive indicator for hedge fund hiring. Investment staff are moving too. Most notably, Citadel added Florent Bénichou as head of US fixed income portfolio finance in January. Bénichou, a mathematics graduate of the prestigious École polytechnique in Paris was previously head of repo and indexing for the Americas at Credit Agricole. 

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