AQR Capital Management, the Greenwich, Connecticut hedge fund firm led by Cliff Asness, posted robust gains across its flagship quantitative strategies in 2025, despite a turbulent year for systematic investing, according to a report by Bloomberg.
The firm’s $6.8bn Apex multi-strategy fund returned 19.6% for the year, driven primarily by stock-picking trades, and rose 3% in December.
AQR’s $6.3bn Adaptive Equities Strategy, a market-neutral equity fund, performed even better, delivering an estimated 24.4% gain for 2025. Meanwhile, the firm’s $5.7bn Helix trend-following strategy, which focuses on alternative market trends, returned 18.6%, comfortably outperforming the SG Trend Index, which rose just 2.5% over the same period.
The strong results coincided with a record year of asset growth for the firm, which now manages $189bn after adding $75bn in 2025. AQR continues to blend academic research-driven strategies with more proprietary, machine-learning approaches to trading.
