This Hedge Fund Trying to Become the Top Pod Shop in Crypto is Rethinking the Multi-Manager Hedge Fund Model | Anatoly Crachilov of Nickel Digital
This Other People’s Money episode is brought to you by CAIA.nxt. Learn more about their alternatives education courses for investment advisors and get 10% off with code MMTEN: https://caia.org/content/welcome-monetary-matters-and-other-peoples-money-listeners
Anatoly Crachilov, CEO and Co-Founder of Nickel Digital Asset Management, joins Other People’s Money to discuss why crypto is the perfect asset class for the multi-manager pod shop model. He also explains how Nickel is taking a “West Berlin” approach to partnering with external traders compared to the “East Berlin” approach of many traditional pod shops where non-competes and strict control of IP is the norm. He also discusses why 2025 has been a difficult year for crypto traders, how their team is managing the choppy markets, and how scaled up pods and incubation stage pods managed the extreme volatility in October.
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Timestamps
00:00 Intro
00:38 CAIA.nxt
01:24 Multi-Manager Origin Story
03:12 No Central Book or Alpha Capture
04:32 Expanding Number of Pods
06:15 Technology Enabled Growth
10:09 Onboarding a New Pod
14:38 Benefits of Crypto's Infinite Divisibility
15:58 CAIA.nxt
16:54 Determining the Scalability of Strategies
18:03 Minimum & Maximum Pod Sizes at Scale
18:33 Measuring Risk Adjusted Returns
20:34 Pod Compensation and Fund Level Fees
24:43 Winning the War for Talent
29:29 Pods Can Be Independent Prop Shops and Single Managers
35:03 Demand for Crypto Multi-Manager Funds
39:02 Reducing Risk in Crypto with 3rd Party Settlement & Custodians
46:08 Crypto Still Has Low Liquidity
49:41 The Cost of Poor Trade Execution in Crypto
53:16 Current Environment for Crypto
58:22 Risk Management Adjustments in a Choppy Year
01:02:04 Different Testing Environments for New Pods
01:06:30 What Happens When a Scaled Pod Has a Drawdown?
01:09:35 Conclusion
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1:10:23
More Credit Problems, Mag 7 AI CapEX Continues, and Money Market Stress | Jack & Max
This Monetary Matters episode is brought to you by Fiscal.ai. Sign up for a 2-week free trial and get 15% off any paid tier at: http://fiscal.ai/mm
Jack Farley & Max Wiethe breakdown yet another credit “cockroach” that appears to be more related to fraud than overall market weakness. They also discuss the Mag 7 earnings report and the continued onslaught of AI CapEx spending that many believe has entered bubble territory. Finally, they breakdown this week’s fed decision and why big changes to both the Fed balance sheet and the rate cutting cycle could be coming up soon.
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Timestamps:
00:00 Fiscal AI Intro
00:12 More Credit Problems
11:08 Mag 7 Earnings
16:43 Fiscal AI Mid Roll
19:29 Are CapEx Estimates Still Too Low?
28:07 AI CapEx “Bubble” Winners and Losers
34:11 Mag 7 Becoming Capital Intensive?
43:33 Fed Meeting Breakdown
52:11 Market Impact of December Fed Meeting
57:11 Fiscal AI
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57:26
Joseph Wang: Fed Likely To Have To Expand Balance Sheet To Avoid Losing Control Over Repo Market
Joseph Wang, former senior trader for the New York Fed and author at FedGuy.com returns to Monetary Matters at a critical juncture to break down the October Fed meeting and the Fed's decision to stop reducing its balance sheet on December 1st and thereby end QT (Quantitative Tightening). Wang, a veteran of money markets, explains the stress he sees in repo markets and why he thinks the Fed has to go further and actually start expanding its balance sheet in order to inject enough liquidity to calm the repo market down. Recorded October 29, 2025.
Joseph's piece on FedGuy, "Balance Sheet Dominance": https://fedguy.com/balance-sheet-dominance/
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1:14:23
The Liquidity Divergence Between East and West | Michael Howell on Deteriorating Federal Liquidity While People’s Bank of China (PBOC) Injects Stimulus and Pumps Gold
Monetary Matters listeners can get 20% discounted access to an annual subscription of Michael Howell’s Capital Wars here: https://capitalwars.substack.com/MonetaryMatters
Michael Howell of GL Indexes and the Capital Wars Substack returns to Monetary Matters with alarming news. His readings of liquidity from over 90 central banks indicate that global central bank liquidity is deteriorating, led primarily by the Federal Reserve. Howell’s measure of Fed liquidity is weakening because the Fed’s Reverse Repo (RRP) facility is effectively fully drained. This is partially offset by U.S. Treasury issuing lots of short-duration bills, as well as People’s Bank of China injecting 7+ Trillion Yuan into its money markets and pumping the price of gold in yuan terms. Howell sees a growing divergence between East and West and warns that 2026 “won’t be a great year for financial assets.” Recorded on October 21, 2025.
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1:57:54
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1:57:54
Credit Concern is Overblown Argues Financials Hedge Fund Manager Beating the S&P 500 | Derek Pilecki of Gator Capital
Derek Pilecki’s hedge fund Gator Capital has outperformed the S&P 500, compounding at over 22% since inception while focusing exclusively on financial sector stocks. In this interview Derek discusses why he thinks recent concern in the financial sector is overblown, how he has grown his firm’s assets to over $300m, and why he believes that good performance is simply not enough to grow a successful hedge fund. Derek also discusses how he manages his mutual fund alongside his hedge fund and why he doesn’t see the vehicles as competing but serving two separate investor bases.
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