Clint Carlson's hedge fund loses its chief risk officer in the latest senior staff departure to rock the firm

• Michael Palys, chief risk officer, has resigned from Carlson Capital.

• Carlson, which was founded by Clint Carlson in 1993, also lost its longtime treasurer Michael Watson and head of fixed income Ivan Ross earlier this year.

• The $8.5 billion hedge fund manager's performance is up this year. It had lost roughly $1 billion in assets toward the 2017 due to poor performance in its biggest funds.

Clint Carlson's Dallas-based hedge fund is losing another senior member of its team.

Michael Palys, the $8.5 billion multi-strategy firm's chief risk officer, submitted his resignation, a source close to the firm told Business Insider. He will be replaced by Jehan Akhtar, who has been with the firm since 2000, most recently as the head of derivatives.

The departure comes at the end of a year when Carlson has also lost its longtime treasurer Michael Watson and head of fixed income Ivan Ross.

The firm, which celebrated its 25th anniversary in October, has improved its performance this year after a tough end to 2017 when assets fell by roughly $1 billion.

Performance in the firm's two flagship multistrategy funds, Double Black Diamond and Black Diamond, have returned 2.73% and 2.28% through the end of November, respectively, a source close to the firm told Business Insider. The two funds, which make up roughly half of the manager's assets, lost 4.47% and 5.99%, respectively, in 2017.

The hardest hit fund in 2017, the Black Diamond Thematic fund, has returned 3.41% through November after losing 22.1% last year.

The three main funds at Carlson have outperformed the industry, which, on aggregate has lost 2% for the year, according to a recent report from Hedge Fund Research.