King of Quants
Jan 30th, 2007 | Filed under: Portable Alpha & Alpha/Beta SeparationBy: Douglas Appell, Pensions & Investments
Published: January 8, 2007
Any of you who have tried to read this article by PanAgora CEO, Eric Sorensen will understand clearly what he meant when he told P&I in a recent interview:
“We’re academics. We do practical research, (at a) very high level, and we love to do it. And oh, by the way, we manage money for fees so we can continue to do the research. That’s really the way I think about our business.”
Sorensen is credited with growing assets by $10 billion in the past 30 months (that’s over $1 million/day, $7,700/minute and $128 a second for those keeping score). How? Sorensen tells P&I that his focus has been on finding a better balance between active and passive (i.e. alpha & beta) investing:
“Two and a half years ago, we had about $13 billion in assets, over half in index funds — very low-fee business. Today, of the $23 billion, almost all of (the growth) is in active strategies.”
With that kind of growth and a quantitative alpha-centric approach, is PanAgora the next BGI or Bridgewater?
Read full P&I article (courtesy: Pensions & Investments)
