Each business day HedgeCo.Net keeps you informed with the top hedge fund industry news, opinion and insight from around the globe. From the latest hedge fund launches, to the impact of regulation, competition, and investor activism - we track the topics and people that make a difference to you.
Bloomberg – Hedge fund managers are trailing benchmark commodity indexes by the widest margin in four years after copper doubled and oil surged 58 percent.
Touradji Capital Management LP, the second-biggest in commodities, earned 7 percent in its largest fund in the first nine months, according to an investor with knowledge of the result. Krom River Trading AG, which has $590 million, lost 8.1 percent in its raw materials fund. Commodity hedge funds lost 3.2 percent through September, according to Hedge Fund Research Inc. of Chicago. All lag behind the 12 percent gain in the S&P GSCI Enhanced Total Return Index.
The Mac Weekly – Larson resigned from the board in August 2007 after the sale of his hedge fund, which had been one of the most successful in the country. Sowood Capital Management was an early, high-profile casualty of the subprime mortgage collapse that preceded the financial crisis. The fund lost more than half of its value in July 2007 when investors ran from corporate credit and traditionally safe bets became began to backfire.
“We’re very happy to have Jeff Larson back on the committee,” Aase said. “He brings a wealth of institutional investment experience with him, along with insights gained from the difficulties he encountered with his hedge fund.”
Bloomberg – The decline in energy demand and drop in German electricity prices may have ended, according to the chief executive officer of hedge-fund manager Energy Capital Management BV.
“The forward prices are at lows, the spot prices are at lows,” CEO Marcel Melis said yesterday at an energy markets and derivatives conference in London. “One thing is for sure — energy consumption will not decrease anymore.”
Bloomberg – Treasury Group Ltd., a Sydney-based asset manager, has made its first investment in a hedge fund, taking a 30 percent stake in AR Capital Management.
Treasury Group, with six partners managing A$10.9 billion ($9.4 billion) in assets under management, also took a stake in Aubrey Capital Management, a global growth equities manager based in Edinburgh, the company said in a statement today. The company didn’t state how much it paid for the investments.
The Washingtom Post – Cerberus Capital Management LP on Tuesday dismissed market speculation that some of its hedge funds, which have suffered losses and heavy redemptions, are in danger of default.
Traders in London and Frankfurt were buzzing with talk that a major hedge fund was headed for default. Much of the talk was directed at Cerberus, a private equity and hedge fund firm hit hard by losses on investments in Chrysler and GMAC.
Chicago Sun-Times – The Chicago Reader, the local alternative weekly, is now under the control of Atalaya Capital Management, a New York-based hedge fund with no previous experience running newspapers.
At a bankruptcy auction in Tampa on Tuesday, Atalaya successfully bid $5 million for the Reader and five other alternative weeklies that comprise the Tampa-based Creative Loafing Inc. alternative newspaper chain. Atalaya beat out Creative Loafing CEO Ben Eason for control of the six newspaper properties.
Creative Loafing got into debt trouble when it borrowed roughly $40 million in 2007 to buy the Reader and the Washington (D.C.) City Paper — $30 million of it reportedly from Atalaya. The company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in September 2008.
New York Times – Russell Herman, the chief executive of the hedge fund firm Dawson-Herman Capital Management, is the latest manager to shutter his fund after heavy losses last year and differences with the firm’s founder, Jonathan Dawson.
Mr. Herman told clients in a letter last week that he was shutting the Southport Millennium Funds and returning capital to investors. The move was first reported by Dealbreaker.com on Friday. The firm currently has about $902 million of capital under management after reaching a height of $3.2 billion at the beginning of 2008.
Like many in the hedge fund industry, Dawson-Herman suffered big losses last year. The main Southport fund was down more than 35 percent and has failed to make up for the losses this year. “We have not been able to build the portfolios with high conviction ideas and themes to the degree that is satisfactory to me and in line with our historical standards,” Mr. Herman said in the letter.
News1130.com – The Securities and Exchange Commission is continuing its investigation of possible insider trading involving hedge fund Pequot Capital Management and its founder Arthur Samberg, according to a letter to investors obtained by The Wall Street Journal.
The SEC has been examining whether Pequot traded Microsoft Corp. shares on confidential information provided by a former employee of the computer company who was later hired by Pequot.
HedgeCo.net (West Palm Beach) – Bandon Capital Management has reached it’s 5th year for its hedge fund flagship investment strategy, ‘Directional Interest Rate Strategy’, (DIRS) producing annualized returns of +7.09% net of all fees, comparatively over the same time period the S&P 500 has lost -2.15%.
The strategy provides investors with absolute returns, uncorrelated with the equity and fixed income markets, by investing in the US Treasury Market using ETF’s or mutual funds and is available to non-accredited investors.
“We’re incredibly proud of this milestone. This is an investment area where there is a tremendous amount of product development activity and innovation." Bill Woodruff, Founder and Managing Principal said, "As advisors and their clients increasingly seek non-correlated, absolute return strategies we stand out for both the length and strength of our track record.”
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HedgeCo.net (West Palm Beach) – Atlanta based hedge fund prime brokerage firm, NorthPoint Trading Partners, LLC, has opened an office in Dallas, Texas, led by industry veteran Chip Miller.
Miller joins NorthPoint from Stadium Capital where he was head trader for 4 years. He will head up both the prime brokerage and the sales trading operations in the region. Miller will report directly to Michael DeJarnette, President of NorthPoint.
“As we continue to expand our presence nationwide, we are very fortunate to have someone join our team who is as talented and experienced as Chip,” says Douglas Nelson, Chief Executive Officer of NorthPoint.
An industry veteran since 1993, Chip has held positions at Jefferies and Co., Clover Partners and Stadium Capital Management. He is experienced in the trading, operational and regulatory aspects of the buy and sell side.
HedgeCo.Net is a premier hedge fund database and community for qualified and accredited investors only. Membership on www.hedgeco.net is FREE and EASY. We also offer FREE LISTINGS for Hedge Funds!
Charity Times – Putting it into perspective, at January 1 2008 there was $9.7trn of hedge funds assets invested, at the end of 2008 it was $3trn, a massive loss in capital.
This year, hedge funds gained 2.41 per cent in March, according to the Barclay Hedge Fund Index compiled by BarclayHedge. The index is now up 0.82 per cent in 2009. ”After an eight per cent sell-off in early March, the S&P 500 Index bounced back to gain 17 per cent from 9 March to 31 March, its largest three-week rally since 1987” says Sol Waksman, founder and president of BarclayHedge. Overall, 15 of Barclay’s 18 hedge fund indices gained ground in March. Hedge funds took modest advantage of March’s upswings in the global equity and credit markets, according to Morningstar’s hedge fund performance summary for the first quarter of 2009.
Highbridge Capital Management, once the world’s biggest hedge fund, was a big winner, with $1bn of net inflows this year, including $225m from majority owner JPMorgan. It ended the quarter with $20bn under management.
CNBC – The Commodities Futures Trading Commission will seriously consider imposing strict position limits on traders placing bets on energy contracts, and that’s just fine with hedge fund manager Mike Masters.
The head of Masters Capital Management blew the whistle on oil speculators last year when he testified before Congress regarding the rapid run-up in oil prices as it reached its record high of $145 a barrel. He is scheduled to testify at the CFTC hearings Aug. 5.
Masters, whose long/short equity fund manages approximately $1.06 billion according to data provider IPREO, believes stringent limits on commodities trading would work.
