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The 2016 Hedge Fund Rising Stars: William Freda

For Graticule Asset Management Asia’s William Freda, there’s no escaping the 24-hour trading cycle of a global macro fund.

William Freda
Graticule Asset Management Asia

William Freda found his first job in finance through Monster.com. In 2003, Freda, newly graduated from Fairfield University in Connecticut, where he majored in business, was using the job search website when up popped a post in the back office of Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce in New York. His second finance job was with a firm launched by a TV ratings monster: New York hedge fund firm Cramer, Berkowitz & Co. When Freda joined as a trader in 2004, founder and CNBC stock-picking personality Jim Cramer had already retired from investing, leaving his former business partner, Jeff Berkowitz, and Matthew Jacobs in charge. Freda, who grew up in New Jersey and has an MBA from Cornell University’s Johnson Graduate School of Management in New York, stayed at Cramer Berkowitz until Fortress Investment Group hired him in 2007.

New York–based Fortress was in expansion mode after recently becoming one of the first alternative-investment firms to launch an initial public offering. Freda, 35, worked as an equity trader in the liquid markets group under macro specialists Michael Novogratz and Adam Levinson. He worked on a team headed by Peter Swartz, a senior portfolio manager for the Fortress Asia Macro funds and a longtime specialist in technology, media and telecommunications stocks. When Levinson spun out from Fortress in 2015 to start his own firm, Graticule Asset Management Asia (GAMA), Swartz went along too with his team, including Freda.

With the formation of GAMA, Levinson moved from New York to Singapore. Swartz and his group also relocated, but only as far as San Francisco. Today managing director Freda, whose father was a senior executive with accounting firm Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu until his recent retirement, trades equities and commodities. Working for a global macro hedge fund firm like GAMA has its challenges: Freda needs to be in the office by 4:00 in the morning, before the U.S. markets open. However, those early hours suit the father of two young children.

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Hedge Fund Rising Stars of 2016

Jessye Ball
Millennium Mgmt
Sarah Berner
Aristeia Capital
Jenna Bussman-Wise
AIG Investments
Maureen Chang
Point72 Asset Mgmt
Dennis Chenfu
Pershing
Charles Dufresne Jr.
Sciens Capital Mgmt
William Freda
Graticule Asset Mgmt Asia
Samantha Greenberg
Margate Capital
Mark Gurevich
Ropes & Gray
Tal Gurion
Mariner Glen Oaks
Craig Huie
University of California
Yusef Kassim
Blue Harbour Group
Florian Kronawitter
White Square Capital
Vikram Kumar
TT International
Brandon Levin
Jana Partners
Jonathan Levin
George Weiss Associates
Brett Minarik
Aksia
Ian Monroe
Etho Capital
Jason Morrow
Utah Retirement Systems
Pierre-Adrien Nicolas
Squarepoint Capital
Jamie Pabst
Green Owl Capital Mgmt
Parag Pande
Blackstone Group
Agata Praczuk
MetLife
Max Saffian
Fortress Investment Group
Matt Satnick
MSD Partners
Eric Singer
Viex Capital Advisors
Katina Stefanova
Marto Capital
Reginald Tucker
New York State Common Retirement Fund
Michael Wang
Cypress Funds
Sean Wygovsky
Polar Asset Mgmt Partners

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