Christopher Rokos
Christopher Rokos is a hedge fund manager and Conservative Party donor.
He was a founding partner at the extremely secretive hedge fund Brevan Howard and the only known photo of him online has been taken from his Linkedin profile - now removed but remains in many articles on him.
In 2008 the Telegraph valued him at £120 million but this figure is expected to be a fraction of what he's worth now now.
Career
After graduating from university, Rokos began working at Goldman Sachs as a swap trader in 1993. He then moved to Credit Suisse First Boston in 1998.
In May 2002 he was the founding partner of hedge fund Brevan Howard (BH) with former boss Alan Howard and other former Credit Suisse employees James Vernon, Jean-Philippe Blochet and Trifon Natsis.[1][2] The company is based in Cayman Islands, a notable tax haven.[3] In 2006 Brevan Howard made £192 million on a turnover of just £203 million - it is unknown how much Rokos made but as a senior trader he must have received a minimum of £30 million.[4] Rokos left the company in 2012 and was forced to sign a contract stating he would not work in the business for five years.[5]
In January 2015, after a long legal battle that looked destined for a high-profile court case, Rokos and BH reached a settlement for him to launch his own asset management business and for BH to take an unspecified financial stake in the new business and provide support setting it up. The legal battle revealed Rokos was paid about $900 million (roughly £600 million) during his time at the hedge fund and that in 2011, the year before he left, he generated $1.2 billion in trading profits (30 percent of the returns) for Brevan's main fund that year.[5]
Activities
In 2008 it was reported that he owns a Grade II listed family house in Greenwich, South London, a flat in South Kensington and a £6 million penthouse in the SoHo district of New York.
In 2007 he bought the former Hyde Park Hotel in Pembridge Gardens, Notting Hill for £18 million. The hotel has 83 rooms and covers 17,000 sq ft and Rokos submitted a 168 page planning application to Kensington and Chelsea council who described his £20 million refurbishment plans as the most lavish they'd received.[4]
In honour of Rokos' achievements, the University of Oxford, his former university, offer 'Oxford-Rokos Graduate Scholarships' that will cover 100 percent of university and college fees and includes a grant of £14,057 for living costs for certain students applying for DPhil courses in economics.[6]
Education
- MA, Mathematics, University of Oxford, 1989 – 1992[1]
- Eton College[7]
Political Donations
Recorded by the Electoral Commission:[8]
| Date | Name of donor | Amount | Donated to | Subsidiary (parties only) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 27/10/2009 | Christopher C Rokos | £50,000.00 | Conservative Party | Central Party |
| 08/02/2010 | Christopher C Rokos | £250,000.00 | Conservative Party | Central Party |
| 28/10/2010 | Christopher C Rokos | £100,850.00 | Conservative Party | Central Party |
| 18/03/2011 | Christopher C Rokos | £30,000.00 | No Campaign Limited | |
| 30/11/2012 | Christopher C Rokos | £99,000.00 | Conservative Party | Central Party |
| 21/05/2013 | Christopher C Rokos | £99,000.00 | Conservative Party | Central Party |
| 17/12/2013 | Christopher C Rokos | £230,000.00 | Conservative Party | Central Party |
| 27/03/2014 | Christopher C Rokos | £170,000.00 | Conservative Party | Central Party |
| 30/06/2014 | Christopher C Rokos | £170,000.00 | Conservative Party | Central Party |
| 26/09/2014 | Christopher C Rokos | £176,000.00 | Conservative Party | Central Party |
Affiliations
Resources
- Holly Watt, The Tory Leader's Group donor club: 'A chance for like-minded people to talk' Guardian, 4 May 2015, accessed 5 May 2015.
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Linkedin Chris Rokos, accessed 5 May 2015.
- ↑ Jesse Westbrook, Saijel Kishan and Katherine Burton Brevan Howard Loses Third Founder as Rokos Said to Leave Bloomberg, 17 August 2012, accessed 5 May 2015.
- ↑ The Hedge Fund Journal Europe 50; Europe's largest single managers ranked by AUM, accessed 5 May 2015.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Martin Tomkinson The UK's richest young entrepreneurs: Top ten Telegraph, 21 February 2008, accessed 5 May 2015.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Miles Johnson Brevan Howard settles dispute with star trader Rokos Financial Times, 21 January 2015, accessed 5 May 2015.
- ↑ Oxford University Oxford-Rokos Graduate Scholarships, accessed 5 May 2015.
- ↑ Nishant Kumar Brevan Howard settles dispute with co-founder Rokos Reuters, 22 January 2015, accessed 5 May 2015.
- ↑ Electoral Commission, Search: 'Rokos', accessed 5 May 2015
- ↑ Chatham House 2013/14 Financial Supporters, accessed 5 May 2015.
