# Leda Maria Braga
Meet the most powerful woman in hedge funds
With $17 billion in assets, Braga manages more than any other female hedge fund manager and more than many other funds run by men.
Leda Braga: Unlocking Wealth
Strategies and Expertise for Financial Growth.
Advanced Investment Strategies
Diversification Expertise
Risk Management Prowess
Who is Leda Braga
CEO/Founder, Systematica Investments Services Ltd
Early Biography
Leda Maria Passos Faria Braga was born in April 1966, in Rio de Janeiro. She studied at Colégio Santo Inácio, in the capital of Rio de Janeiro, where she completed high school in 1982. Since childhood, she exhibited a remarkable aptitude for mathematics from a young age.
In 1982, she was awarded the Brazilian Mathematics Olympiad and, in 1983, she became the first girl to join a Brazilian delegation at the International Mathematics Olympiad, which took place in Paris.
Leda Braga studied Mechanical Engineering at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio) and completed a master’s degree at the same institution. The topic of his dissertation was “Thermal Stress Analysis under Viscoelastic Behavior”.
In 1988, she began her PhD in “Fracture Mechanics” at Imperial College London. Leda finished the program in 1990, starting to teach at the institution, in addition to leading research projects. In 1993, however, she decided to change her career, leaving academia for the financial market.
Career in Finance
Leda Braga went to work at J.P. Morgan bank, where her knowledge of mathematics proved very useful. At the bank, Leda Braga worked for seven years as a quantitative analyst in the derivatives research team. Afterwards, she worked as an executive at Cygnifi Derivatives Services, responsible for the “valuation” area. In financial market jargon, “valuation” refers to the work of estimating the real value of some asset. Cygnifi was a company spun off from J.P. Morgan.
At J.P. Morgan, Leda Braga met future billionaire Michael Platt, who also worked at the bank. In 2000, Platt founded the management company BlueCrest and, in 2001, the Brazilian went to work with him, becoming president and head of the company’s systematic negotiations area.
In 2004, she launched and managed what became one of the firm’s largest strategies and funds, BlueTrend. The fund uses a “managed futures” strategy, meaning it trades the futures contracts of stocks, bonds, currencies and commodities and looks for trends in the movements of their prices, so-called trend following.
In January 2015, Leda Braga formally lunched Systematica Investments, a computer-driven fund strategy, with approximately $17 billion in assets under management and offices in London, Geneva, Singapore, Shanghai, and Jersey, following years with the prominent European hedge fund firm BlueCrest Capital Management. Geneva-based Braga manages the same amount she ran at BlueCrest, $8.5 billion, solidifying her position as the most influential female hedge fund manager globally, leading her own venture.
Leda is an inspiration in the financial market, not only in the universe of hedge funds and in the quantitative world, but also an inspiration for all women who dream big.
video credit: Talks at GS
“Big enough to matter. Small enough to care.”
LEDA BRAGA, CEO, SYSTEMATICA INVESTMENTS