After posting losses amounting to 6.5 percent in 2016, giant hedge fund Citadel announced it is laying off over a dozen employees from its investment team.
Analysts, associates and portfolio managers were given the boot from Surveyor Capital, one of Citadel’s three internal units which invest in stocks globally. Citadel is based in Chicago and founded and headed by billionaire Kenneth Griffin.
At the end of January, the head of Surveyor, Jon Venetos, was dismissed and replaced with Todd Barker. Until this recent overall the number on staff at Surveyor was 200, most of them investment staff.
The layoff comes as Mr. Griffin is dealing with a rare stretch of losses for the company which has a sterling reputation as a money-maker. Only last year the Wall Street Journal reported in a Page One story that Citadel was in an aggressive and profitable expansion after experiencing serious losses during the financial crisis.
Last year Surveyor rose 14 percent, much better than similar funds.
“Surveyor has been a very successful business over time, and we have strong leadership and a great team in place,” a Citadel spokeswoman said in a statement.