Some senior people slipped away from Brevan Howard's commodities business

If you are a hedge fund with a successful commodities trading business, you can make a lot of money. Witness Citadel. Witness all the other hedge funds getting in on it. 

Brevan Howard cut its teeth as a macro hedge fund, but is now a multistrategy hedge fund, and it trades commodities like many others. However (and also like many others), some of Brevan's commodities people have not stuck around.

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Several senior people have left Brevan's commodities business. Some left last year but have not previously been reported. Others left at the end of Q1.

The exits are understood to include Elycia Sherman, Brevan's former head of commodities who joined from Hartree Partners in November 2023. Sherman, who declined to comment for this article, is thought to have left last year.

More recently, Kobi Platt, the head of commodities strategy, went to Bridgewater. Robert Alpen, a natural gas trader in Switzerland, retraced his steps to commodities trading firm Englehart. And Jeff Nietschmann, a portfolio manager in Austin, Texas who joined from Millennium, left for Castleton Commodities. All three coincidentally left in March 2026.

When Sherman arrived in late 2023, Bloomberg reported that she would be building a new team with a likely allocation of $750m. Brevan Howard didn't comment at the time, but Bloomberg noted that Brevan's previous foray into commodities trading ended with losses in 2014.

Platt, Alpen and Nietschmann all arrived on Sherman's watch. Sherman joined in November 2023. Platt and Alpen joined in May 2024. Nietschmann joined in November 2024. 

Brevan Howard declined to comment. The fund is still trading commodities. Maybe it needs some more commodities portfolio managers?

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