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 – Bret Grebow, co-founder of hedge fund HMC International LLC, was sentenced to four years in prison for defrauding investors out of $7.8 million in what prosecutors said was “a classic Ponzi scheme.”
Grebow, of Highland, Florida, was also ordered to forfeit $7.8 million after pleading guilty last year to investment adviser fraud. U.S. District Judge Barbara Jones in Manhattan imposed the sentence. Grebow, 33, faced a maximum prison sentence of five years.
“He was very remorseful,” defense attorney Vincent Gelardi said in an interview after today’s sentencing. “He was young at the time. He lost control of the situation.”
Reuters – Investment adviser MAG Capital and its owner settled U.S. regulators’ claims that it took warrants from three hedge funds it advised without compensating them, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said on Tuesday.
The Los Angeles-based investment adviser and owner David Firestone, without admitting or denying the SEC’s allegations, will pay $100,000 and $50,000, respectively, to settle the SEC’s complaint.
On 44 separate occasions, between 2003 and 2006, MAG took warrants from its clients without compensating their funds for them, the SEC said.
According to the SEC, MAG’s hedge fund clients made investments in so-called private investment in public equity (PIPE) transactions.
The PIPE transactions included warrants and other securities. The hedge funds paid for the warrants as part of the bundle of securities sold by the issuers in the transaction.
However, MAG took a portion of the warrants in each transaction and did not compensate the hedge funds for the warrants it took, the SEC alleged.
KPR Capital Limited announces the launch of the KPR Diamond Fund. The fund offers investors a unique access to physical diamonds capitalising on the price appreciation of top quality colourless diamonds.
The Fund aims to provide returns which are not correlated with traditional asset classes, act as a hedge against inflation and benefit from the supply/demand imbalance over the long term. The fund is part of KPR Fund SPC, a Cayman Islands open-ended investment company.
The investment manager has engaged a team of diamond industry experts that have in-depth knowledge and industry insight of the diamond market.
The fund’s investment adviser is Goldwinds Asset Management Limited, a London based asset management firm.
Giovanni Pennetta, CEO of Goldwinds Asset Management, said:
“The long term outlook for diamonds is robust. We are confident that this fund will provide the means for investors to diversify their portfolio and gain exposure to physical diamonds in a cost-efficient way. We see this as a huge investment opportunity that investors should not miss.”
The fund is open to investors in February and will launch on the 2nd March 2009. The fund has a minimum investment of US$ 250,000. Investors in the fund may benefit from the option to purchase stones on selected diamond sales by the fund at a wholesale price. The Diamond Segregated Portfolio may be offered, sold or transferred directly or indirectly to Non US Taxpayers and US Tax-exempt investors. US Taxpayers may invest in interest of the Partnership, KPR Diamond Fund L.P.
New York (HedgeCo.Net) – UBS AG will pay $200 million to settle the SEC charges that the Swiss Bank acted as an unregistered broker-dealer and investment adviser.
According to the original compliant, UBS helped certain U.S. individuals to set up and maintain undisclosed Swiss bank accounts, which enabled these clients to evade U.S. taxes. In addition, UBS acted as an unregistered broker-dealer and investment adviser from 1999 to 2008, to thousands of U.S. clients while holding billions of dollars in assets for them. UBS allegedly raked in profits of up to $140 million a year from this business.
“UBS avoided compliance with U.S. securities laws for many years, at the same time they were engaged in other illegal conduct, which makes this one of the most egregious cases of its kind," said Scott W. Friestad, Deputy Director of the SEC’s Division of Enforcement in a recent press release.
The SEC alleges that UBS was fully aware that it was required to register with their agency. They believed that UBS lured clients by sending them to exclusive events such as art shows, yacht outings and sporting events, all sponsored by the bank. In addition, client advisors who traveled abroad to the U.S. were given encrypted laptops and were trained on how to avoid detection by authorities.
In addition to the $200 million fine, UBS will settle criminal charges with the Department of Justice in which they will pay an addition fine of $180 million, and another $400 million in tax-related payments.
Julie Scuderi Senior Editor for HedgeCo.Net Email: julie@hedgeco.net
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Bloomberg – Mario Gabelli is buying Wyeth to book a 13 percent profit from its takeover by Pfizer Inc. Managers at Cohen & Steers Inc. are scooping up closed-end funds trading at a 16 percent discount to the value of their holdings. Huntington Asset Advisors Inc. is betting the widest gap between silver and gold prices in 14 years will narrow.
A year ago, these so-called arbitrage strategies would have been favorites of hedge funds whose debt-fueled trading squeezed out other investors. Since then, the credit-market seizure wiped out about 920 of the 10,096 funds in business at the start of 2008, according to Hedge Fund Research Inc. The survivors have reduced borrowing to close to nothing, according to Rasini & C., a London-based investment adviser.
Bloomberg - A hedge fund manager who used the same defense lawyer as Bernard Madoff received a sentence that was a third of the maximum possible after he was convicted of defrauding investors out of $10 million.
Vincent Montagna remains free on bail more than two years after pleading guilty. He was sentenced to 40 months in prison instead of a possible 9-year term. His lawyer, Ira Sorkin, also represents Madoff, the New York investment adviser U.S. prosecutors accused of running a $50 billion Ponzi scheme.
Though Montagna and Madoff aren’t known to be connected beyond their choice of attorney, the case may provide a window on Madoff’s prospects in avoiding or reducing the maximum 20 years in prison he faces if convicted. Madoff, 70, is free on bail, though restricted to his Manhattan apartment.
Bloomberg – Mario Gabelli is buying Wyeth to book a 13 percent profit from its takeover by Pfizer Inc. Managers at Cohen & Steers Inc. are scooping up closed-end funds trading at a 16 percent discount to the value of their holdings. Huntington Asset Advisors Inc. is betting the widest gap between silver and gold prices in 14 years will narrow.
A year ago, these so-called arbitrage strategies would have been favorites of hedge funds whose debt-fueled trading squeezed out other investors. Since then, the credit-market seizure wiped out about 920 of the 10,096 funds in business at the start of 2008, according to Hedge Fund Research Inc. The survivors have reduced borrowing to close to nothing, according to Rasini & C., a London-based investment adviser.
Reuters – Maxam, an investment adviser based in Darien, Connecticut, relied on the auditors for their expertise in examining Madoff’s firm, according to the lawsuit filed in Connecticut Superior Court in Fairfield County.
The lawsuit, though, said the auditors issued "unqualified" opinions for 2006 and 2007 audits that stated Maxam’s financial statements presented its true financial position.
Maxam was one of many funds that invested with Madoff, who in December was arrested for allegedly running a $50 billion (35.2 billion pounds) Ponzi scheme. Maxam contends the auditors were negligent when performing Maxam’s 2006 and 2007 audits.
Philadelphia Inquirer – A federal grand jury indicted an Indiana investment adviser Tuesday on charges of deliberately crashing his small airplane in the Florida Panhandle to try to fake his own death as part of a plan to escape financial ruin.
Authorities say Marcus Schrenker, 38, an amateur daredevil pilot and businessman, secretly parachuted to the ground before the crash and sped away on a motorcycle he had stashed away in central Alabama.
A three-day search came to an end on Jan. 13, when authorities finally caught up to Schrenker at a campground near Tallahassee, where they say he tried to take his own life by slashing one of his wrists.
CNBC – The hedge fund industry has been battered this year, suffering heavy losses in part due to redemptions by investors as they asked for their money back amid the market turmoil.
According to a Singapore-based hedge fund research firm Eurekahedge, the industry has lost some one-fifth of its assets this year to $1.55 trillion. About $125 billion of the losses came from redemptions.
The scandal surrounding Bernard Madoff is certainly not helping the industry. The investment adviser and former Nasdaq stock market chairman has allegedly swindled clients out of $50 billion through a bogus fund. It’s forgivable if seasoned high-net worth investors get cold feet and steer clear of this form of investment.
Stephen Gollop, CEO of Tyche, expects one-third of the hedge funds to disappear in the first-quarter of next year.
AllAfrica.com – While the bank chiefs and the Central Bank of Nigeria have consistently advised Nigerians to keep faith with the ailing Nigerian Stock Exchange market, an investment adviser is suggesting that Nigerian investors should begin to seek alternative ways of investing their monies for better returns as the bearish trend in the market continues unabated.
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Mr. Olumide Oyetan, a director with the Stanbic IBTC Asset Management gave the suggestion when he delivered a paper titled: "Global financial crisis and its impact on the Nigerian financial market" at the Stanbic IBTC Asset Management limited end of year investors’ forum held in Lagos. According to him, "the benefit of alternative investments is to enhance total return and diversification of investments."
The alternative areas of investments he said are; Private Equity/Venture Capital, Credit/Structured Notes, Emotional Assets (Coins, Jewellery, Fine Art & Wine, etc) and Timber/Farmlands and Oil & Gas. Other options with high returns are "derivatives or physicals such as managed futures, commodities, currencies, hedge fund strategies, trading in volatility, carbon emissions, and weather derivatives among others."
Washington, D.C., Jan. 3, 2008 – The Securities and Exchange Commission has received and posted on its Web site the text of the RAND Corporation’s final report on practices in the investment adviser and broker-dealer industries. The Commission has been anxious to receive RAND’s study of the investment adviser and broker-dealer industries, and the nature of their relationships with customers. The report will assist the Commission’s efforts to update our regulations to improve investor protections in today’s new marketplace," said SEC Chairman Christopher Cox. Our staff is now studying the report and the potential regulatory implications of its findings. RAND produced the report under contract with the Securities and Exchange Commission (http://www.sec.gov/news/press/2006/2006-162.htm). The report is the product of more than a year of empirical study and analysis. Following a March 2007 Court of Appeals decision that overturned a 2005 SEC rule permitting non-adviser broker-dealers to charge fees to investors based on account size, the SEC and RAND agreed that RAND would deliver its final, peer-reviewed report in pre-publication format on Dec. 31, 2007, three months earlier than the contract had originally required. The text of the posted report is final and has been peer-reviewed. Neither the data nor the analysis on which it is based will change.
