Hedge fund cut top French quant who really wanted to work there. 42 minutes ago The last time we wrote about Damien Couture, it was 2023 and he really wanted to work for hedge fund Verition. This intention was proving problematic for him because Couture, a quant trader, had just spent nearly seven years at Jump Trading and Jump Trading had a two year non-compete. Couture was challenging the non-compete in court. That was November 2023. In May 2023, Couture joined had Verition in London. Now it's July 2026, and he's gone again. Couture didn't respond to a request to comment for this article. However, the FCA Register shows that his registration at Verition in London ended on July 6th. Sources say he was stopped out by the fund after hitting his drawdown limit. Couture has been a quant since 2007 but Verition was his first stint at being a portfolio manager at a multistrategy hedge fund. He previously worked for electronic trading firms G-Research and Jump Trading. Couture is a mathematics graduate of the prestigious École polytechnique. Verition has a reputation as a comparatively pleasant sort of hedge fund to work for. However, all hedge funds have strict risk limits and are prone to cutting people whose losses exceed a specified maximum. It's been a difficult time for quant funds. Bloomberg reported earlier this week that funds have had their worst performance since 2023 as a result of wild swings in momentum trades. Verition has made various portfolio manager hires this year, including Jerome Brochard, an MD from Nomura's quantitative investment solutions team; Bruno Baisch, a systematic PM from ExodusPoint; and Praveen Visesh, a macro PM from ExodusPoint. It's thought that Couture will remain at Verition for two months and will move on after September. It's not clear where he will go next. Nor is it clear what will become of his team. Presumably they won't be bound by another non-compete. Follow me on X. Follow me on LinkedIn. Have a confidential story, tip, or comment you'd like to share? Contact: +44 7537 182250 (SMS, Whatsapp or voicemail). Telegram: @SarahButcher. Signal: sarahbutcher.22 Click here to fill in our anonymous form, or email [email protected]. Bear with us if you leave a comment at the bottom of this article: comments are moderated intermittently by human beings. Sometimes these humans might be asleep, or away from their desks, so it may take a while for your comment to appear. You must take sole responsibility for comments you post on this site. We will take reasonable steps to weed out anything that we consider to be offensive or inappropriate. The essential daily roundup of news and analysis read by everyone from senior bankers and traders to new recruits. Boost your career. Find thousands of job opportunities by signing up to eFinancialCareers today. Top Articles

SRP Weekly: the autocallable boom continues. We bring you the most read stories in the past week from our news desk. Calamos' CAIE has hit US$1 billion in assets in less than 12 months. The asset manager reflected on the management of this groundbreaking autocallable ETF in an interview with SRP. In the US structured notes market, a surge in issuances propelled BNP Paribas to second place in May, with only Goldman Sachs ahead First Trust is preparing to list the FT Vest Laddered Autocallable Buffer & Resilient Income ETF on NYSE Arca, featuring a maturity buffer feature for its lineup, according to an SEC filing. SRP held a webinar on autocallable ETFs on Thursday with four panellists across ETF providers, investment banks and wealth managers. The replay can be accessed here. BlackRock has rolled out the iShares Bitcoin Premium Income ETF (BITA), an exchange-traded product (ETP) designed to provide investors with Bitcoin upside participation while generating monthly option premium. S&P Dow Jones Indices (S&P DJI) has expanded its covered call index offerings with the launch of the S&P 500 8% Premium Covered Call Index, a strategy designed to deliver a targeted level of income through a systematic options overlay on US equities. In the US structured notes market, a surge in issuances propelled BNP Paribas to second place in May, with only Goldman Sachs ahead, as the street monthly volumes hit a new high, shows our latest US market review. New York-based Prosperity Life Group introduced its PathWay Series fixed index annuities (FIAs) on Monday, offering six index accounts including two strategies that are seen in the market for the first time. Canadian investment management firm Ninepoint Partners has introduced the Ninepoint SpaceX HighShares ETF (SXHI), a covered call strategy, on the Toronto Stock Exchange. Purpose Investments last week also brought a covered call ETF on Cboe Canada offering exposure the latest IPO blockbuster - the Purpose SpaceX Yield Shares ETF (SPXY). Apollo Global Management has appointed Keshiv Desai as partner and head of structured investment solutions, bolstering its capabilities in customised investment strategies as alternative asset managers increasingly target wealth management and institutional distribution channels. Former Macquarie, Citi and Deutsche Bank executive takes the helm at Bloomberg Indices as the benchmark provider expands its role in quantitative and outcome-oriented investment solutions. Jérôme Brochard has joined Verition Fund Management from Nomura as managing director in London, marking the latest senior hire by the multi-strategy hedge fund as it builds out its investment and quantitative capabilities. In part one of a two-part roundup, we review how funds registered in Switzerland and Dublin performed in May. The opening session of the SRP France Conference 2026 brought together representatives from the French structured products industry to examine two of the sector's most debated topics: performance and transparency. Trading activity on Euronext Access Paris was broadly stable in May, with total daily average value traded at €32,442 (US$37,609), down 0.9% month-on-month (MoM) but 19.1% above the 12-month average. In Asia, Société Générale Corporate & Investment Banking (CIB) has appointed Marc Saffon as group country head for Japan, effective 1 September. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has published draft amendments to its Standardised Approach for Counterparty Credit Risk (SA-CCR) framework and invited public comments until 1 July. An estimated KRW5.8 trillion (US$3.7 billion) was collected from 1,387 structured products offered on the South Korean primary market in May, according to our latest Korea market review. Hong Kong regulators have co-launched a joint pilot project to explore the use of a digital payment solution for after-hours trading (AHT) in the derivatives market. In Singapore, DBS Bank Ltd has introduced tokenised physical gold - DBS Physical Gold Token - for customers in a first for the retail market, according to the bank. Do you have a confidential story, tip or comment you'd like to share? Contact Us | SRP (structuredretailproducts.com)