Hedge funds are locked in a fierce talent war, shelling out pay packages worth tens of millions to secure top talent — and that means executives are going all-in to woo prospective hires, even at the entry-level.
Umesh Subramanian, Citadel’s chief technology officer, leads the tech teams that power the firm’s investment, research, and risk-management platforms. He told Business Insider that he personally calls some of the most in-demand candidates during the decision-making process to see where their head is at. That includes not just senior-level recruits, but also recent grads, he said.
“I get on the call with them to understand how they’re going to make the decision — what is driving their decisions,” Subramanian said. “And oftentimes we win those candidates.”
In general, the CTO said he looks for four qualities in top candidates: intellectual curiosity; a passion for winning as a team; an interest in commercial applications and not just theory; and a strong engineering background and education.
While Subramanian directly contacts some of the most sought-after candidates, those conversations haven’t always resulted in them getting hired. The CTO said that sometimes the phone calls have led him to suggest they look elsewhere because another company may be more aligned with the role they describe being interested in.
“I’ve had a couple of conversations where I’ve said, ‘Look, I think you should take the other job,'” He said he thinks Citadel is a great and “highly selective” company at which to start your career, but that “it is not for everyone.”
Ongoing talent wars
Subramanian isn’t the only executive to personally reach out to top talent in the interview process. OpenAI’s Sam Altman has been similarly been said to call candidates to convince them to join the tech company, and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has previously shown up in email chains to recruit talent, as well as reportedly hosted top candidates at his home for meals.
While the talent war at hedge funds isn’t new, the scramble for AI talent has added another layer of competition to the hiring process and raised the stakes for recruiting the right people — many whom are highly sought after by traditional tech giants.
Banks like Goldman Sachs and Bank of America have allocated billions to their tech budgets, with a portion of that investment going into hiring.
Subramanian said he has always been personally engaged in recruiting, and it’s part of the company’s culture for executives to be highly involved in seeking out top talent.
Citadel, specifically, is among the most competitive hedge funds. In 2025, the hedge fund and its sister firm, Citadel Securities, accepted just 0.4% of applicants for its summer training program, a record-low acceptance rate. Together, the two firms received 108,000 applications — a 20% increase from the previous year.
“Exceptional talent, world-class talent, is worth fighting for with everything that you got,” Subramanian said.
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