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The 2016 Hedge Fund Rising Stars: Jason Morrow

The deputy CIO of Utah Retirement Systems helped to build the pension fund’s hedge fund portfolio.

    Jason Morrow
    Utah Retirement Systems

    Although Jason Morrow was born in Utah, he didn’t spend much of his early childhood in the desert state. When Morrow was three, his father’s corporate career prompted the family to move to Portland, Oregon; from there they went to Chicago, then Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Morrow, 36, also served as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Argentina and Houston. But he graduated from high school in Utah, where he earned a finance degree at the University of Utah’s Eccles School of Business in Salt Lake City.

    His grandfather, who worked in banking, instilled in him from a young age an appreciation of the power of compound interest on savings. This lesson made Morrow reluctant to take on any debt to fund his college education; as a result, he worked his way through undergraduate school, emerging debt-free. He had planned to attend law school, but after not winning acceptance to his top pick, he earned an MBA at the University of Utah. His classes there and his involvement with the university’s student-run venture capital fund inspired Morrow to pursue a career in investing.

    In 2007, while he was working on the VC fund and finishing his MBA, a friend told him that a large local investor was looking for interns. That investor turned out to be Utah Retirement Systems. Under CIO Bruce Cundick the pension fund was adding to its alternative investments and getting into hedge funds for the first time. Morrow applied for an internship and was offered a job as an analyst with URS’s hedge fund group. He has been with the $32 billion firm ever since, a core part of the team that assembled its hedge fund portfolio. Promoted to deputy CIO last year after an external search, Morrow doesn’t plan on leaving Utah anytime soon.

    Visit the2016 Hedge Fund Rising Stars: Ivy League Schools Pave the Wayfor more.

    Hedge Fund Rising Stars of 2016

    Jessye Ball
    Millennium Mgmt
    Sarah Berner
    Aristeia Capital
    Jenna Bussman-Wise
    AIG Investments
    莫林常
    Point72 Asset Mgmt
    Dennis Chenfu
    Pershing
    Charles Dufresne Jr.
    Sciens Capital Mgmt
    William Freda
    Graticule Asset Mgmt Asia
    Samantha Greenberg
    Margate Capital
    Mark Gurevich
    Ropes & Gray
    Tal Gurion
    Mariner Glen Oaks
    Craig Huie
    University of California
    Yusef Kassim
    Blue Harbour Group
    Florian Kronawitter
    White Square Capital
    Vikram Kumar
    TT International
    Brandon Levin
    Jana Partners
    Jonathan Levin
    George Weiss Associates
    Brett Minarik
    Aksia
    Ian Monroe
    Etho Capital
    Jason Morrow
    Utah Retirement Systems
    Pierre-Adrien Nicolas
    Squarepoint Capital
    Jamie Pabst
    Green Owl Capital Mgmt
    Parag Pande
    Blackstone Group
    Agata Praczuk
    MetLife
    Max Saffian
    Fortress Investment Group
    Matt Satnick
    MSD Partners
    Eric Singer
    Viex Capital Advisors
    Katina Stefanova
    Marto Capital
    Reginald Tucker
    New York State Common Retirement Fund
    Michael Wang
    Cypress Funds
    Sean Wygovsky
    Polar Asset Mgmt Partners