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. Follow Anatoly Crachilov on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anatoly-crachilov/ Follow Max on X: https://x.com/maxwiethe Follow Other People’s Money on: Apple Podcast https://bit.ly/4e7QJ1M Spotify https://bit.ly/3Yhaazi YouTube https://bit.ly/3C63VXR X https://x.com/opmpod 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