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.
Boston Globe – French bank BNP Paribas’s revenues from corporate and investment banking nearly doubled in the second quarter as robust investor demand boosted revenues from the bank’s fixed income business unit.
BNP Paribas’s CIB revenues totaled 3.351 billion euros ($4.82 billion) for the quarter, up 81 percent from the second quarter of 2008, and following record revenues of 3.696 billion euros in the first quarter of 2009.
”Once again, fixed income revenues were exceptional,” said David Thebault, head of quantitative sales trading, at Global Equities, in Paris.
Forbes – French bank Societe Generale (SocGen) plans to reduce its holdings in its China fund joint venture due to regulatory concerns after a global reorganisation, two people familiar with the situation said.
SocGen already owns a fund venture with a unit of Shanghai Baosteel Group, and will become an indirect stakeholder in Credit Agricole’s Chinese venture after the two banks complete a planned merger of their global asset management businesses.
Reuters – One of London’s top analysts, James Montier, has resigned from French bank Societe Generale to join a hedge fund, a source with knowledge of the situation said on Thursday.
The source did not say which hedge fund has employed Montier, recently voted best strategist in the Thomson Extel survey, alongside colleague Albert Edwards.
The pair joined Societe Generale from Dresdner Kleinwort in December 2007 as co-heads of global strategy.
Reuters – A team of hedge funds managers at Societe Generale is leaving to set up their own hedge fund with capital from the French bank, La Tribune reported on Tuesday.
The paper said the move was led by Arié Assayag, head of Sgam Alternative Investments at SocGen, who would take with him some 15 members of staff to create a new outfit called Premium Asset Management (PAM).
ReviewJournal.com – The majority owner of the Greek Isles blamed "greedy hedge-fund guys" interested in wiping out the current owners’ equity stake for pushing the property into Chapter 11 bankruptcy Monday.
Harold Rothstein said the Greek Isles’ creditors have already taken $14 million in fees and interest out of the property since the financial markets collapsed.
"The ownership of the property was negotiating in good faith to reorganize and reposition the property," Rothstein said. "Even though the plan that was presented (to the creditors) was a plausible plan, the New York hedge fund is still acting like it was two years ago. They’re trying to play the big, bad wolf."
Globe and Mail – Amaranth Advisors LLC and two of its former traders have reached a settlement with U.S. regulatory staff over the alleged manipulation of natural gas futures prices.
The deal, which was submitted to the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, could end the long case against hedge fund traders Brian Hunter and Matthew Donohue.
A spokesman for Mr. Hunter, a Calgarian who made more than $100-million trading natural gas for Amaranth before the hedge fund collapsed, declined to comment.
The commission accused the traders last year of manipulating prices on the New York Mercantile Exchange, and proposed a $291-million (U.S.) fine.
Financial Times – Brian Hunter, the trader who was blamed for the collapse of $9bn hedge fund Amaranth Advisors two years ago, has taken advantage of last month’s plunge in commodity prices to help propel the year-to-date return at the fund he now advises to 230 per cent.
The Peak Ridge Capital Commodities Volatility fund, which Mr Hunter advises, returned 24 per cent in July as commodities prices fell 10 per cent for the month.
The prices were down 19 per cent from their peak on July 3rd – the biggest monthly decline since March 1980, measured by the Reuters-Jefferies CRB Index.
Slumping demand and steadily rising inventories sent the prices for contracts ranging from oil to soyabeans plunging in July, suggesting that the six-year-old commodity bubble may have burst.
