Machines automated trading. Archimedes automates the decision.
Archimedes is the AI system built by Nomad Fulcrum to make investment decisions: what to buy, hold or sell, how much, and when. It decides within the rules a firm sets, every business day, and records the reason for every position.
Markets have two layers. Machines took over only one.
Trading is automated: execution and market-making happen in seconds, run by machines. Deciding is still done by people. Which assets to hold, how much risk to take, and when to change course: these calls are made by committees and portfolio managers, weeks or months apart.
automated
Skill only shows up across many independent decisions.
A committee that meets monthly takes about a dozen a year.
Archimedes takes one every business day.
of professionally managed assets are decided by machines.
($142T) is still allocated by human judgement. This is the layer Archimedes automates.
~3%: about $5T decided by machines (smart-beta and factor ETFs, systematic hedge and mutual funds, CTAs), our own sum of published figures, out of $147T global assets under management. ~97%: $142T of $147T. Sources: BCG Global Asset Management Report 2026; AQR, Alternative Thinking 3Q17; HFR Global Hedge Fund Industry Report Q1 2026; ETFGI; BarclayHedge.
It does the investment
committee's job.
Every day.
Archimedes looks at the market, forms a view on each market, turns those views into one portfolio, keeps it inside its risk limits and corrects it as markets move. An investment committee does this monthly or quarterly. Archimedes does it every business day, the same way each time. Each day it reads prices, liquidity, flows and macro data across all its markets in parallel. A team of analysts could not redo that work every day.
Prices, liquidity, flows and macro data from markets where the price never stops.
Every business day, inside rules set by people.
Every position sized against the rules it was given.
Orders go to the bank that holds the assets.
One decision, in six steps.
Archimedes reads the market, forms a view, checks the rules, decides, sends orders and records why. Step through one illustrative day below. The times, markets and figures are a simulation, not live positions.
One engine. Each firm sets its own rules.
A mandate is a written set of rules: how much risk to take, which markets to trade, and which limits apply. People set these rules and Archimedes decides inside them. The assets stay in the firm's own account at its bank, and the firm chooses whether the engine runs the whole book or one part of it. Two firms with different rules get two different portfolios from the same engine on the same day. A new firm gets its own configuration of the same engine.
A mandate needs at least one market.
It keeps risk steady.
Archimedes targets a steady level of risk. When a market becomes twice as volatile, the position halves on its own, without anyone having to step in. When the market calms, the position grows back. It only runs in markets with a live price every day: currencies, equity indices, government bonds and commodities. Assets valued once a quarter give it nothing to react to.
Normal market. The position is 22% of capital.
Illustrative. Beyond single positions, limits also apply per currency and to groups of markets that move together.
Ten positions can be one bet.
Markets that move together count as one exposure. Archimedes finds these groups from the data each day and caps them, so a portfolio that looks spread out can't quietly turn into a single bet. In a crisis, groups merge. Switch the view to "Stressed" to see it.
Every decision can be replayed and checked.
Each decision is logged with its inputs and its reasons. The demo below shows how a hash-chained ledger makes any later edit visible: every entry carries a fingerprint, a short code computed from its contents and from the fingerprint before it. Change a past entry and every fingerprint after it stops matching. Try it.
Any past decision can be run again from its logged inputs, back to 2022, and produces the same result.
Each position carries its reasons: which signals, which limits applied, which were close to binding.
People write the mandate and are the only ones who change it. Archimedes decides inside it.
What a partner firm would see.
Below is a demo of the control panel for a firm's mandate. Each screen answers one question in plain language, from what the engine decided today to whether its record is intact. Everything in it runs on simulated data.
All figures in the panel come from a simulation of the engine. They are not Nomad Fulcrum's results.
Built for firms that already manage money.
Archimedes is not sold to individuals. Our clients are licensed investment firms that have their own clients, bank and brand, and want the investment decision made systematically inside their own rules.
A systematic strategy without
building a quant team.
83%* of Swiss independent asset managers employ ten people or fewer. Hiring quants means payroll long before revenue. Archimedes runs inside the firm's own rules instead.
The decision layer, bought like custody.
Banks already buy custody, execution and risk systems from specialists. The investment decision can be bought the same way.
Years of live decisions they can't buy.
A licence can be acquired. Four years of live decisions on real client capital cannot be.
* Based on FIN21, Unabhängige Vermögensverwalter in der Schweiz 2026.
Nomad Fulcrum builds Archimedes.
Nomad Fulcrum Capital SA, based in Lausanne, holds an asset-management licence from FINMA, the Swiss financial regulator. That licence allows Archimedes to decide on client capital. The licence, the engine and the first AMC were built on the company's own balance sheet.
“Give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world.”Archimedes
The fulcrum is the licence. The lever is Archimedes.
- May 2022Nomad Fulcrum starts
- Aug 2022First live decisions
Archimedes begins deciding on real client capital.
- Dec 2024FINMA licence granted
Swiss asset-management licence, after a two-year process.
- Jan 2026First AMC issued
Nomad Fulcrum's first actively managed certificate (AMC): a security built around a mandate Archimedes runs.
- TodayOpening the engine to other firms
Nomad Fulcrum configures the engine to a firm's own rules.
Questions about Archimedes?
For partnerships, due diligence or a walk-through of the engine, write to us.