Variant Perception

Jonathan Tepper is the Chief Investment Officer and the primary investment decision-maker at Variant Perception. Tepper previously worked as a macro analyst at Bank of America and as a hedge fund analyst. Ben Graham serves as Director of Research, overseeing the quantitative modeling and thematic analysis that underpins the firm's macro calls (per Bloomberg, 2020).

The firm uses a combination of quantitative models and narrative analysis. Its quantitative framework incorporates macroeconomic data, market pricing, and behavioral indicators. The qualitative overlay draws on historical analogies and structural macro narratives — Tepper has publicly cited the work of Viktor Shvets and John Kenneth Galbraith as influences. Research is disseminated daily to subscribers and forms the basis for the firm's own capital deployment (per financial media).

It is structurally both. Variant Perception operates a subscription-based macro research service for institutional investors while also managing a proprietary investment book. This hybrid model is uncommon — most firms choose one structure to avoid conflicts between serving external clients and trading for internal accounts. Variant Perception's approach requires careful regulatory and compliance management (per firm's public positioning).

The firm covers macro across equities, fixed income, currencies, and commodities. Its research universe spans developed and emerging markets, with particular emphasis on US Treasury markets, foreign exchange pairs (especially USD/JPY and EUR/USD), precious metals like gold, and equity indices. The firm does not typically analyze individual stocks or sectors except where they are used as macro expressions (per published research excerpts).

Variant Perception's investment book appears to be proprietary capital — it is not publicly marketed as a fund open to external investors. The firm's revenue model is primarily based on subscription fees for its research product, which is available to institutions, hedge funds, and family offices. It is not registered with the SEC as an investment adviser managing third-party capital, based on public disclosures (per regulatory filings search).