AHL, the $23 billion commodity trading advisor run by Man Group, has set up a standalone trading team in Hong Kong, which will more than double the number of staff the fund has in the city to 11. The enlarged team, which is among the first of its kind for a CTA in Hong Kong, is designed to cater to investors looking for specialisation in Asian markets.

A newly added operations team will give AHL faster local support for trading and enable further specialisation in Asian markets. With its expanded team, the new trading operation in Hong Kong covers 49 Asian markets, trading around $4 billion a day. 

“Hong Kong is a tremendous base for our business in Asia and this expansion will help us to provide the very best trading and risk management services for clients in the region,” said Tim Wong, CEO of AHL. “We have a great network across the continent and we will continue to build relationships and explore new trading ideas through local talents.”

Man has been in Asia for over 15 years, having first established a distribution office in Hong Kong in 1995. The AHL Asia trading desk was launched in 2009 to build closer working relationships with local exchanges and facilitate expansion into new asset classes within the region. 

Man also has three additional offices in Asia Pacific – in Singapore, Tokyo and Sydney. As well, 25% of Man's global funds under management were distributed in Asia Pacific. 

“The trading team is now supported by local portfolio research and system implementation teams, including infrastructure and operations specialists,” Wong said. “The AHL Asia desk will cover the Asian trading session, with a seamless handover to a London team for the European open.”  

Recently, AHL has worked hard to increase trading efficiency. In the past two years, the Asia desk has reduced Asian trading costs by more than 20%, and 98% of regional trading can now be processed electronically, with detailed analytics used to optimise the use of this capability.

"We have honed our execution style and algorithmic trading services to boost risk management and performance," added Wong. "These improvements have enabled us to add new asset classes to our trading models and we've recently expanded trading of several instruments including Asian stock index futures, interest rate swaps, relative value strategies, and a number of Asian currencies.”