London-based hedge fund Qube Research & Technologies (QRT) is building a high-tech data centre in Akureyri, Iceland, to boost its ability to analyse huge amounts of data as it bids to identify market discrepancies and profit from them, according to a report by Reuters.
From its origins as an $800m spinoff from Credit Suisse just seven years ago, QRT has grown into a $23bn powerhouse, ranking in the top 1% of hedge funds that manage over $20bn in assets. As well as leveraging cutting-edge technology to generate outsized returns, QRT has also adopted an unconventional corporate culture at odds with the operations of multi-strategy majors including Citadel and Millennium Management.
Led by co-founders Pierre-Yves Morlat and Laurent Laizet, QRT eschews Wall Street’s typical hub-and-spoke structure, has no presence in New York, avoids star culture, and operates with a centralised decision-making model under CIO Laizet. Collaboration and teamwork are prioritised, with only 10% of its 1,400 employees fitting the traditional portfolio manager profile. The rest include technologists and researchers who might just as easily work at Google or Meta.
QRT operates more like a tech company than a traditional hedge fund, with the firm spending hundreds of millions annually on technology and data, 10 times more than when it launched. Last year, it hired 232 IT professionals, 157 researchers, and just 48 traders.
The firm’s Icelandic data centre, set to be operational within six months, is another example of how QRT is rethinking hedge fund operations. The facility will enhance its ability to process vast amounts of market data, potentially giving it an edge in identifying profitable opportunities.
