AQR Apex UCITS Fund

The AQR Apex UCITS delivered a +6.8% net of fees return in Q1 2025. Each of Stock Selection, Market Neutral Macro, and Arbitrage contributed to gains. Directional Macro detracted over the quarter. 

Stock Selection: Gains were concentrated in developed large cap stocks while there were also small gains in developed small cap stocks and a negligible contribution from emerging stocks. From a signal standpoint, positive performance came from signals that rely on unstructured, event-based or alternative data, ones that identify relative mispricing between similar stocks, signals that exploit indirect shocks that propagate through our proprietary company networks and ones that prefer companies with stronger underlying fundamentals. The stock selection strategies also benefitted from timing the signals themselves over the period.

Market Neutral Macro: Market Neutral Macro added to performance with gains coming from all four asset classes, though the largest contributions came from fixed income. Within fixed income, gains came primarily from steepener yield curve positioning.

Arbitrage: Arbitrage contributed to performance over the quarter, with gains mainly coming from merger and convertible bond arbitrage.

Directional Macro: Directional positioning in macro markets detracted from performance over the quarter mainly due to reversals in several alternative commodities which led to small to modest losses per position. A few notable alternative commodities that experienced reversals over the quarter were orange juice, European emissions and Dutch natural gas.