Tulchinsky’s WorldQuant Ventures Buys Stake In Benzinga

(Bloomberg) -- Igor Tulchinsky, who runs a quant-trading firm that manages money for $34.2 billion hedge fund Millennium Management, bought a stake in financial news and data website Benzinga.

Tulchinsky’s WorldQuant Ventures, which invests his own money in startups, devoted an undisclosed amount as part of a $3 million funding round by Benzinga, the companies said Thursday in a statement. Benzinga, which is based in Detroit, also raised money from investors including Dan Gilbert, who founded Quicken Loans and owns the Cleveland Cavaliers basketball team, and Groupon Inc. co-founder Eric Lefkofsky.

“Benzinga is already a top financial news site, particularly with active traders and millennials, and we believe it has tremendous growth potential within the investment world,” Steven Lau, managing director of WorldQuant Ventures, said in the statement.

Tulchinsky started WorldQuant Ventures, which is based in Old Greenwich, Connecticut, two years ago. It has invested in firms that focus on everything from artificial intelligence to water management, according to its website. The unit is separate from WorldQuant, which Tulchinsky started in 2007 as an investing group of Millennium, Israel Englander’s firm.

Benzinga’s content is syndicated to 70 partner websites such as Yahoo! Finance and MSN, and clients include TD Ameritrade Holding Corp., according to the statement. The firm said it’s looking to make hires including data scientists, editorial staff and developers. Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News, competes with Benzinga in providing news and information.

“Benzinga is focused on changing the way banks, quant hedge funds and individuals consume information,” Benzinga Chief Executive Officer Jason Raznick said in the statement.

Before starting WorldQuant, Tulchinsky spent 12 years as a Millennium money manager focusing on statistical arbitrage, a mathematical strategy that seeks to profit from price differences across markets.

To contact the reporter on this story: Saijel Kishan in New York at skishan@bloomberg.net. To contact the editors responsible for this story: Margaret Collins at mcollins45@bloomberg.net, Josh Friedman, Alan Mirabella