Hedge fund paying $50m for portfolio managers says it can hire people cheaply
Balyasny Asset Management (BAM) the hedge fund run by Dmitry Balyasny, a seemingly pleasant billionaire who was once a door-to-door salesman, has a lot of money to spend on hiring people. Last summer, Bloomberg reported that BAM had $200m to spread around new recruits.
It's not clear whether that has now been spent, but comments made recently by Dmitry Balyasny suggest the budget may be going further than at other funds.
As we reported earlier today, Balyasny told Institutional Investor that BAM is a nice place to work, where people are treated well and there's a team-building and collaborative environment. Because of this, Dmitry said the fund regularly wins "recruiting situations with less money," particularly when it comes to guarantees and upfront pay.
BAM declined to comment for this article, but Balyasny's comment suggests that some of the large packages it's recently been said to offer new recruits might have been even bigger had they gone elsewhere.
In April, for example, Balyasny was said to hire Ron Choy from BlueCrest on a package of $30m. In March, it was said to hire Dave Brodsky from Citadel on a package of $50m after Citadel attempted to support him through a $60m drawdown. Maybe both men were cheap at the price?
Balyasny has long had a reputation for being more gentle with portfolio managers on drawdowns than some of its rivals. There are, however, limits to its patience: in 2023 several portfolio managers left after the fund made a $100m loss.
Market insiders reflect that all hedge funds are gentle, until portfolio managers begin losing money. They also note that while Dmitry said Balyasny pays less in upfront packages, he also claimed that people join BAM because they want to be a partner there. Being a partner is far more lucrative in the long term.
Not everyone at BAM is paid $50m. Balyasny doesn't file accounts globally. In London, it hasn't filed accounts for a while. The most recent UK accounts*, for the year ending December 2023, show BAM employing 219 people in London and paying them an average of £883k each in salaries and bonuses. Partners typically also get a share of the profits, although they fell to just £4m at the UK partnership that year. Maybe partners are cheap now too?
*For Balynasy International Asset Management
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