David Harding (financier)

David Harding

David Harding in an interview with Michael Covel
Born David Winton Harding
August 1961 (age 54)
Oxford, England
Residence London, England
Nationality British
Education Pangbourne College
Alma mater St Catharine's College, Cambridge
Occupation Investment management
Years active 1982 to present
Known for Founder of Winton Capital Management
Net worth IncreaseGB£1.0 billion (April 2015)[1][2]

David Winton Harding (born August 1961) is a British billionaire businessman, and the founder, executive chairman and CEO of Winton Capital Management (or Winton).[3] He had previously co-founded Man AHL (formerly Adam, Harding & Lueck).[4]

He favours quantitative investment strategies, using scientific research as the basis of trading decisions. His philanthropic works include the establishment of a chair at the University of Cambridge and a center at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development, both dedicated to the study of risk, and the foundation of a research programme into the physics of sustainability at the University of Cambridge's Cavendish Laboratory.

Education and early career

David Winton Harding was born in August 1961.[5] He studied at Pangbourne College and went on to read physics at St. Catharine's College, University of Cambridge,[6] graduating in 1982[7] with first class honours.[8][9] Later that year he began a traineeship at Wood Mackenzie, a stockbroker.[10] After two years, he joined the futures brokerage firm, Johnson Matthey & Wallace, as a trader in commodity futures.[8][10][11]

Investment management

In 1985, Harding became a futures trader at Sabre Fund Management, one of the first commodity trading advisors (CTAs) in the United Kingdom.[12] He drew on his scientific background to design trading programs for futures markets.[10] He remained with the firm for two years,[9] until founding Adam, Harding & Lueck (AHL) in 1987 with Michael Adam and Martin Lueck.[9][10][12]

The firm created AHL as a quantitatively focused CTA.[10] In 1989, ED & F Man (which later became the Man Group) purchased a 51 percent stake in the firm.[10] When Man bought the whole firm in 1994,[6][8][9][12] Harding became head of Man Quantitative Research.[9][13] In 1996, he left to set up his own firm. According to Barron's, Harding had left Man after becoming frustrated by lack of focus on research and the bureaucracy of working in a large firm.[6][12]

Winton Capital Management

Harding founded Winton, an investment management firm, in 1997. It was named after his middle name and his father's first name.[2][9] According to Hedge Fund Review magazine, his aim was to demonstrate that a business can be successful based on empirical scientific research, rather than relying on marketing.[8] Inspired by US hedge fund management company Renaissance Technologies,[10] Harding recruited scientists to the firm to create a strong research environment[14] and to use quantitative, statistical research of market trends to inform his trading decisions.[10]

The fund had been launched in 1997 with $1.6 million in assets; as of 2013, the fund had returned on average 15% net per year.[15] As of February 2012, Harding had launched two more Winton funds and his firm held a total of $28.5 billion in assets.[16]

Harding has been described by industry commentators as "one of the pioneers of the hedge fund industry".[4][6] He has been ranked among the top 50 hedge fund managers worldwide by Alpha magazine,[17] which added him to their "Hedge Fund Hall of Fame",[18] and he was listed at 131 on the Sunday Times Rich List 2014.[19]

In 2010, he was London's highest paid earner at £60m a year.[20] In 2011 Harding was the founder, chairman and head of research of Winton.[21] In September 2012, Harding "headed" The Independent's list of "Britain's biggest taxpayers".[22][23] Within 6 days, Harding revealed that "he was paying £34 million in tax on his £87m income."[24][25]

As of 2012 he was the firm's majority owner.[26] Harding has previously served as Winton's president[3] and, as of 2014, he was the executive chairman and CEO.[27]

Philanthropy

Harding has made major donations to educational and research institutions through his Winton Charitable Foundation.[28] The foundation funded a professorship at the Statistical Laboratory of the University of Cambridge, the Winton Professorship of the Public Understanding of Risk, aimed at increasing understanding of the mathematics of risk for individuals and organisations.[8][14][29] Harding is also the patron of the Harding Center for Risk Literacy at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin,[10] which opened in 2009.[30]

Harding's foundation, the David and Claudia Harding Foundation, has pledged £20 million to the Cavendish Laboratory, the University of Cambridge's Department of Physics, to establish The Winton Programme for the Physics of Sustainability, a research programme to apply theoretical physics to issues of the sustainability of natural resources.[19][7][31] The donation to the Cavendish is the largest since it was created in 1874.[31] He is one of the managers of the Winton Fund for the Physics of Sustainability, which manages the programme's funding.[32] In 2011 Winton began a five-year sponsorship of the Royal Society Prizes for Science Books which was rechristened the Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books.[33] Harding's foundation has also committed £5m to the Francis Crick Institute in London for cancer research.[19] In 2014, it provided a £5 million donation to the Science Museum in London, the largest single donation in the museum's history, to build a gallery of mathematics.[34][35][34][36]

Personal

Harding had three sons with his first wife, whom he divorced in 1997. He is now married to Claudia Harding.[37]

References

  1. ↑ "Sunday Times Rich List". The Sunday Times (page 34). 26 April 2014.
  2. 1 2 Biographical details in Daily Telegraph article, January 2013
  3. 1 2 Kristen Hallam (22 April 2013). "Goldman Partner to Help Raise Funds for Crick Institute". Bloomberg. Retrieved 6 June 2013.
  4. 1 2 Barry Cohen (November 2007). "Winton's Winning Formula". Absolute Return.
  5. ↑ "Winton Capital Management Limited". Companies House. Retrieved 10 August 2015.
  6. 1 2 3 4 "Harding's Hedge Fund Thrives on Surprise". Reuters Hedgeworld. 16 October 2009.
  7. 1 2 "Physics of sustainability programme launched at Cavendish". news.admin.cam.ac.uk. University of Cambridge. 24 March 2011. Retrieved 30 September 2011.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 "A Head for Numbers". Hedge Fund Review. August 2009.
  9. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Profile: Winton wonderland". FOW Magazine. October 2006.
  10. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Leah McGrath Goodman (April 2008). "The Wizard of Winton". TraderDaily.com. p. 106.
  11. ↑ Roberta C. Yafie (22 July 1986). "Mocatta Futures to buy JMB's brokerage unit.". American Metal Market. Retrieved 14 June 2013.
  12. 1 2 3 4 Jack Willoughby (29 June 2009). "Trend Tracker". Barron's Hedge Funds.
  13. ↑ "Profile: Winton wonderland – David Harding's Winton Capital takes a stand against rising exchange fees". Futures & Options World (FOW). 1 October 2006. Retrieved 14 June 2013.
  14. 1 2 Bill McIntosh (8 October 2007). HedgeWorld Daily News. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  15. ↑ Margie Lindsay (21 June 2013). "Winton Futures Fund: Winton Capital Management". Risk. Retrieved 16 June 2014.
  16. ↑ Jez Liberty (20 March 2012). "Trend Following Wizards update February 2012;".
  17. ↑ Katherine Griffiths (19 August 2008). "Finance at its very highest; Britain's biggest private companies". The Daily Telegraph (London). p. 7.
  18. ↑ "Alpha Hedge Fund Hall of Fame:The Iconoclasts". Alpha (Euromoney Institutional Investor) 8. 2014.
  19. 1 2 3 "Rich List 2014". thesundaytimes.co.uk. The Sunday Times. 18 May 2014. Retrieved 22 May 2014.
  20. ↑ Fernandez, Colin (26 September 2010). "Rambler with an interest in Bible studies is the City's highest earner on £60m a year". London: Daily Mail. Retrieved 19 March 2013.
  21. ↑ Kerr, Simon (September 2005). "Winton Capital Management Simon Kerr talks to David Harding". The Hedgefund Journal. Retrieved 23 October 2011.
  22. ↑ "The business elite who prove that you can be rich and play fair". The Independent (London). 24 September 2013. Retrieved 6 June 2013.
  23. ↑ Cusick, James (24 September 2013). "Reveased Britain's Biggest Taxpayers". The Independent (London). Retrieved 6 June 2013.
  24. ↑ Nicholas Hellen (6 June 2013). "Rich man pays his taxes – shock". The Sunday Times. Retrieved 29 April 2013.
  25. ↑ Matthew Sparkes (30 September 2012). "Hedge fund founder David Harding reveals £34m tax bill". The Telegraph (London). Retrieved 6 June 2013.
  26. ↑ Harriet Agnew (24 January 2012). "David Harding realises dream at Winton". E-Financial News. Retrieved 6 June 2013.
  27. ↑ Ben Wright (2 March 2014). "Winton Capital Plans Expansion Drive With Up To 100 New Hires By Year-End". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 22 May 2014.
  28. ↑ "The Winton Charitable Foundation". charitiesdirect.com. Charities Direct. Retrieved 30 September 2011.
  29. ↑ "Cambridge appoints Professor of Risk". news.admin.cam.ac.uk. University of Cambridge. 12 January 2007. Retrieved 30 September 2011.
  30. ↑ "New Harding Center for Risk Literacy". mpib-berlin.mpg.de. Max Planck Institute for Human Development. 21 April 2009. Retrieved 4 October 2011.
  31. 1 2 "£20 million donation to revolutionise physics research". news.admin.cam.ac.uk. University of Cambridge. 15 November 2010. Retrieved 30 September 2011.
  32. ↑ "Winton Programme for the Physics of Sustainability Inaugural Celebration". winton.phy.cam.ac.uk. Winton Programme for the Physics of Sustainability. 24 March 2011. Retrieved 30 September 2011.
  33. ↑ "Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books Shortlist Announced". http://royalsociety.org. External link in |work= (help)
  34. 1 2 Alex Bellos (10 September 2014). "Science Museum unveils £5m plan for 'world's foremost' mathematics gallery". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  35. ↑ Louise Jury (10 September 2014). "Hedge fund boss gives £5 million to build new museum maths gallery". London Evening Standard. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  36. ↑ Robert Dex (10 September 2014). "£5m Zaha Hadid-designed maths gallery for Science Museum". The Independent. Retrieved 24 November 2014.
  37. ↑ http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1315366/David-Harding-Citys-highest-earner-60m-year.html
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