Hedge fund Citadel is rumored to be exiting the fund administration business by selling Omnium to Northern Trust, according to Dow Jones Newswire.
Omnium is the fund administration arm of Citadel, which was rebranded from Citadel Solutions in late 2009 but has serviced third-party clients since 2007. According to its website, it has $70 billion of assets under administration (AuA).
Citadel concluded that a name change would help attract more hedge funds and reassure its own investors about its independence, but Omnium’s results in the Global Custodian 2010 Hedge Fund Administration survey show an organization still dogged by this perception of being entwined. “Potential conflict within ownership structure and shared technology staff, said one respondent.
Northern Trust has been working to organically grow its hedge fund administration business as its results in the 2010 HFA survey show, with AuA up to $82 billion across both single funds and fund of funds and and full-service operations in Chicago, Dublin, Guernsey, London and Luxembourg.
When reached for comment about the deal, a spokesperson from Northern Trust said that the custodian “does not comment on rumors or market speculation.”