I would agree: while not impossible, it seems like some key information is missing.

On the one hand I would definitely expect zero empathy from a hedge fund. They should pay big bucks (pounds in this case), but if they consider an employee no longer useful it is an instant goodbye.

But firing a key engineer of a successful production system that they plan to operate -- no way!! Neither 48 hours after going live, nor 6 (or 12, 18 or 24) months later. Trading strategies always get refined, changed and tuned and an oops in that process can be very expensive. A hedge fund would fight to keep the key engineer who built the system.

One case where this is possible is if a bigger fund wants to snuff out a new entrant (for example because the smaller fund is messing up the larger fund's strategy). Then the owners get $$ and everyone else gets the boot. My 2c.