Key Takeaways
- • Abraxas Capital Management's flagship Elysium Global Arbitrage Fund won The Hedge Fund Journal's Digital Currency Performance Award 2026 for Best Performing Fund in 2025 and over 2, 3, 5 and 7 years ending December 2025, in the Market Neutral Arbitrage (AUM > $1bn) category.
- • Abraxas manages circa USD 4 billion, which the publication says makes it the largest digital currency hedge fund manager it could identify across several databases.
- • The strategy pursues market-neutral spot price, funding rate and interest rate arbitrage across CeFi, DeFi and TradFi, combining discretionary allocation with systematic execution.
- • Abraxas has attracted more than 300 institutional and professional investors, including endowments, private wealth platforms, family offices and high net worth individuals.
- • Founder Fabio Frontini shifted the firm from a TradFi volatility strategy into digital finance in 2018, prioritizing regulation, compliance and capital preservation.
Summary
Abraxas Capital Management's oldest and flagship strategy, the Elysium Global Arbitrage Fund, has won The Hedge Fund Journal's Digital Currency Performance Award 2026 for Best Performing Fund in 2025 and over the 2, 3, 5 and 7 year periods ending December 2025, in the Market Neutral Arbitrage (AUM > $1bn) strategy category. The firm reports assets under management of circa USD 4 billion, which the publication says makes it the largest digital currency hedge fund manager it could find across several databases.
The strategy uses proprietary technology to pursue textbook arbitrage and lending trades, including spot price, funding rate and interest rate arbitrage across CeFi, DeFi and TradFi markets. The trades are designed to be uncorrelated with the direction of digital asset markets and to deliver predictable profits, provided counterparties meet their obligations and market liquidity remains sufficient. The article notes that the fund's strong Sharpe and Sortino ratios are of limited meaning given the absence of down months. Investment decisions are made at the manager's discretion, while trade monitoring and execution are systematic, with the trading team setting whitelisted parameters for profit, risk, position size, and exchange and counterparty exposure.
Founder Fabio Frontini began his career in 1994 as a proprietary trader at banks including Merrill Lynch and UBS, and founded Abraxas in 2002 as a TradFi manager focused on long volatility and gamma strategies. After exploring energy, non-performing loans and trade finance, he moved into digital finance in 2018. Head of Trading Carlo Zaffaroni joined in 2017 to develop digital strategies. Abraxas has been UK regulated from the start, added Malta regulation for its first digital currency fund, and recently obtained Monaco regulation. Business development lead Antonio Bozzo, who joined in 2024 after roles at Pictet, Vontobel and Barclays Wealth, is identified in the article as Head of Growth.
According to the article, Abraxas avoids trend following, mean reversion, pattern recognition, statistical arbitrage and market making, and does not trade privacy coins for compliance reasons. It also declined crypto equity premium and discount trades such as MicroStrategy and Grayscale, citing unstable correlations and legal risk. The firm says it will only consider OTC trades that can be hedged on exchange. Management says the strategy generated positive returns in every calendar year, including 2022 and 2025, and that its 24-hour monitoring and stress testing helped during those periods.
The strategy uses proprietary technology to pursue textbook arbitrage and lending trades, including spot price, funding rate and interest rate arbitrage across CeFi, DeFi and TradFi markets. The trades are designed to be uncorrelated with the direction of digital asset markets and to deliver predictable profits, provided counterparties meet their obligations and market liquidity remains sufficient. The article notes that the fund's strong Sharpe and Sortino ratios are of limited meaning given the absence of down months. Investment decisions are made at the manager's discretion, while trade monitoring and execution are systematic, with the trading team setting whitelisted parameters for profit, risk, position size, and exchange and counterparty exposure.
Founder Fabio Frontini began his career in 1994 as a proprietary trader at banks including Merrill Lynch and UBS, and founded Abraxas in 2002 as a TradFi manager focused on long volatility and gamma strategies. After exploring energy, non-performing loans and trade finance, he moved into digital finance in 2018. Head of Trading Carlo Zaffaroni joined in 2017 to develop digital strategies. Abraxas has been UK regulated from the start, added Malta regulation for its first digital currency fund, and recently obtained Monaco regulation. Business development lead Antonio Bozzo, who joined in 2024 after roles at Pictet, Vontobel and Barclays Wealth, is identified in the article as Head of Growth.
According to the article, Abraxas avoids trend following, mean reversion, pattern recognition, statistical arbitrage and market making, and does not trade privacy coins for compliance reasons. It also declined crypto equity premium and discount trades such as MicroStrategy and Grayscale, citing unstable correlations and legal risk. The firm says it will only consider OTC trades that can be hedged on exchange. Management says the strategy generated positive returns in every calendar year, including 2022 and 2025, and that its 24-hour monitoring and stress testing helped during those periods.
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