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Professional Pensions – The Universities Superannuation Scheme has appointed UBS Global Asset Management – Fund Services to deliver hedge fund of funds administration services.
The country’s second largest pension fund said it had enhanced its in-house hedge fund selection capability in recent months, by implementing an absolute return strategies programme.
West Palm Beach (HedgeCo.net) – International financial services provider TMF Group has expanded into boutiqe and hedge funds in Australia through the acquisition of Sydney administrator, Kingsway Taitz Fund Administration Pty Ltd,.
Recognised as a leading provider of boutique and hedge fund administration services in the Asia‐Pacific region, Kingsway Taitz has been top ranked in its peer group for the past two years by the annual Global Custodian Hedge Fund Administrator Survey.
"The increasing demand for our services made it apparent that the next phase of growth required the backing of a global fund administrator with strong financial resources." Brian Taitz, managing director of Kingsway Taitz said “This transaction provides the opportunity to align with a like‐minded global fund administration company that shares our values and culture."
“This transaction brings together two highly successful companies – one global and one local with complementary skills and values, and a shared focus on client service and staff development," managing directors of TMF Eric Koolen and Catherine Caradus, said. TMF has over 175 fund administration clients.
Eric Koolen, who has 20 years of fund administration experience, will lead the combined organisation in Australia. Brian Taitz will continue to be involved on a day to day basis for up to six months to ensure a seamless integration of the two organisations. The company says there will be no immediate changes.
Kingsway Taitz has retained Capital Advice as its financial adviser in relation to this transaction.
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Boston Globe – State Street Corp., which specializes in serving institutional investors and wealthy customers, said Thursday it has been selected to provide hedge fund administration services for about $6 billion in assets advised by Caxton Associates.
State Street’s hedge fund administration company International Fund Services will provide accounting, fund administration, tax and risk services to five master-feeder fund structures managed by New York-based Caxton Associates and affiliates.
"Our decision to select IFS as our independent fund administrator was based on their long and significant experience servicing highly sophisticated and complex hedge funds in the industry," said John G. Forbes, chief operating officer of Caxton Associates.
West Palm Beach (HedgeCo.net) – Citi is opening a daily operational suite of solutions for hedge fund managers that they hope will improve efficiency and allow managers to focus on optimizing investment decision making.
"The Hedge Fund Middle Office service has been designed to improve operational efficiency and transparency for hedge fund managers by providing independent third party operations," said Chandresh Iyer, Head of Global Custody and Investment Administration Services at Citi. "It can be used either on a stand-alone basis, or in conjunction with Citi’s suite of Hedge Fund Administration services," he added.
Citi’s Hedge Fund Middle Office services include a comprehensive suite of post-trade and pre-settlement services which are scalable and modular. The services are global and include technology solutions that help manage daily trade processing and P&L reporting, OTC confirmation and valuation, collateral management, corporate action processing and cash management. In addition, Citi’s solution allows hedge funds to move to a more variable operational cost model – an especially attractive feature in the current cost-constrained environment. Hedge Fund Middle Office services are available to funds operating in North America, Latin America, Europe and Asia-Pacific.
With the addition of Hedge Fund Middle Office, Citi’s Global Transaction Services now offers an end-to-end hedge fund servicing platform. The solutions include administration, custody and OpenPrime, a portfolio management and order management system that is prime broker agnostic.
Global Transaction Services, a division of Citi’s Institutional Clients Group, offers integrated cash management, trade, and securities and fund services to multinational corporations, financial institutions and public sector organizations around the world. With a network that spans more than 100 countries, Citi’s Global Transaction Services supports over 65,000 clients. As of the first quarter of 2009, it held on average $278 billion in liability balances and $10.3 trillion in assets under custody.
West Palm Beach (HedgeCo.net) – The top 10 hedge fund adminstraators reported $1.64 trillion in hedge fund assets under administration (AuA) in the Q4 2008, according to HFN, with Citco Fund Services, State Street Alternative Investment Solutions and Goldman Sachs Administration Services taking the top three positions.
HFN also released early estimates for February hedge fund asset flows which indicate the outflow from the industry continued during the month, but at a much slower rate than prior months. Early estimates show hedge fund assets fell an additional 2.2% in February 2009 to $1.746 trillion compared to a reduction of 7.6% in January 09.
The drop was largely due to net investor redemptions and fund liquidations of $35.9 billion during the month and combined with a reduction due to performance losses of $3.53 billion. Early estimates have the HFN Hedge Fund Aggregate Average -0.61% for February, but this figure will likely go lower as more funds report.
Taking into account internal estimates of where month end performance will likely settle, February 2009 should go down as the 5th highest level of hedge fund outperformance over equity markets in the last twenty years.
The Q4 2008 HFN Administrator Survey contains information on hedge fund and fund of funds assets under administration (AuA) from 60 administrators. Results detail total reported AuA, regional concentration, growth rates and top ten lists for more than 20 criteria.
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