Hedge Fund Rising Stars: Justin Press

Justin Press, co-head of prime brokerage at New York–based global trading and fund services firm BTIG, spied an opportunity in 2004. Press, a nephew of Joel Press, an accountant and founding figure in hedge fund services, was then working as head of Midwestern prime brokerage sales for UBS. He realized that as hedge fund firms were growing into massive, multibillion-dollar businesses, large prime brokerages were paying less and less attention to smaller hedge fund firms. So eight years ago Press, now 38, moved to San Francisco–based broker-­dealer Baypoint Trading and began building up its prime brokerage group. In 2005, when Baypoint merged with New York–based Bass Trading, Press became co-head of the prime brokerage business at the new entity, BTIG. Today, BTIG has more than 325 hedge funds on its prime brokerage books.