The multi-strategy hedge fund has become the dominant institution of the buy side in the last decade, and its defining quality is that it is not supposed to have bad months. It is supposed to have dull ones. September tested that promise and, for the most part, kept it.
According to performance figures compiled by Business Insider’s Bradley Saacks and published October 6, Citadel’s flagship Wellington fund gained 1.1 percent in September, bringing its return for the year to 13.4 percent. Millennium Management, the largest of the pod shops by assets, was flat for the month and up 8.1 percent for the year. Point72 Asset Management, Steve Cohen’s firm, rose 0.2 percent in September and 10.9 percent year to date. Man Group’s multi-strategy fund, Man 1783, gained 1.9 percent in the month, also reaching 10.9 percent for the year.
Further down the table, the picture was mixed. Schonfeld Strategic Advisors was flat for the month and up 6.8 percent for the year. ExodusPoint Capital Management, founded by the former Millennium executive Michael Gelband, lost 0.7 percent in September and was up 4.1 percent for 2026. Balyasny Asset Management was up 0.1 percent for the month and 0.7 percent for the year. Walleye Capital slipped 0.2 percent and is down half a percent for 2026. Verition Fund Management lost 1.3 percent in September and was up 2.7 percent year to date.
Why the spread matters
These are not dramatic numbers by the standards of a single-manager stock picker, and that is the point. Multi-strategy funds allocate capital to dozens or hundreds of trading teams, each with tight loss limits, and use leverage to turn small, uncorrelated gains into respectable annual returns. Their investors, mostly institutions, pay unusually high fees, including pass-through expenses that can exceed the traditional 2 percent management fee, in exchange for consistency.
When the dispersion between the best and worst of these firms widens, as it has this year, it shows up in two places: in the flow of investor capital, and in the flow of traders. A firm up 13 percent can pay its portfolio managers handsomely and recruit aggressively; a firm up less than 1 percent has to explain itself to both its investors and its people. The talent war among the pod shops, with multi-year guarantees and sign-on packages that rival the old Wall Street partnership payouts, is driven as much by these tables as by anything else.
Citadel’s year
Citadel’s lead is not limited to the flagship. Business Insider reported that the firm’s Tactical Trading fund was up 28 percent for the year through September. For Ken Griffin, who moved Citadel’s headquarters to Miami in 2022, the performance is a reminder that the firm remains a formidable New York presence, too: Citadel is the anchor tenant at 425 Park Avenue, the Norman Foster-designed tower developed by L&L Holding, a commitment first reported by Commercial Observer in 2016. Griffin is also one of the most prominent political donors in finance, largely to Republican candidates and causes, and has been candid in public remarks about his views on taxes, regulation and urban crime. He is also a major philanthropist, with large gifts to Harvard and to the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. Whatever one thinks of his politics, his firm’s record this year speaks for itself.
Millennium’s patience
Millennium’s flat September is less troubling than it looks. Israel Englander’s firm, headquartered at 399 Park Avenue and managing roughly $97 billion, according to Business Insider, has built its reputation on avoiding drawdowns rather than chasing the top of the table. An 8.1 percent return through September, with low volatility, is squarely within what its investors expect. The more consequential question for Millennium in recent years has been succession and ownership: the firm has explored selling a minority stake to outside investors, according to multiple reports, a move that would give a valuation to one of the most profitable private partnerships on Wall Street.
Point72 and Man
Point72, based in Stamford, Connecticut, and Man 1783, the London-listed Man Group’s flagship multi-strategy offering, finished September level with each other at 10.9 percent for the year. Cohen, who also owns the New York Mets, has spent the year expanding Point72’s quantitative and macro businesses. Man’s strong September is notable because the firm is less often included in conversations about the American pod shops, despite running one of the oldest systematic trading operations in the industry.
What comes next
The fourth quarter is when the pod shops’ compensation decisions are made, and when investors decide whether to add to or trim their allocations for the following year. The firms at the top of this table will spend the next two months fielding inquiries; those at the bottom will spend it defending their risk models and retaining their best teams.
For New York, which remains the industry’s center of gravity despite the much-chronicled moves to Florida, the standings matter in a more tangible way. They determine who signs the next lease on Park Avenue, who outbids whom for an Upper East Side townhouse, and whose name appears on the next museum wing. The scorecard is, in that sense, the city’s other society page.
Featured image: 425 Park Avenue, Citadel’s New York tower. Photo by Kidfly182 via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.
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