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Bloomberg – It was a crisp autumn day in November 2005 when hedge fund manager John Ho entered the half- century-old Electric Power Development Co.’s headquarters in Tokyo, betting that Japan’s corporate attitudes were ripe for change.
Ho, then director of Asia-Pacific investments at the Children’s Investment Fund Management UK LLP, also known as TCI, was ushered into a conference room with a worn carpet to meet with Masayoshi Kitamura, then executive vice president of the utility. The visitor, who was offered a bottle of water, told Kitamura he wanted to learn more about the company’s plans for growth.
Reuters – Activist hedge fund firm TCI, which launched an attack on ABN AMRO in 2007 that helped trigger the Dutch bank’s sale, has seen profits surge 73 percent but warned this year will be tougher.
The Children’s Investment Fund Management (UK) LLP reported profit available for sharing among members of 555.9 million pounds for the year to end-August 2008, up from 321.0 million pounds a year before.
Reuters – Activist hedge fund firm TCI, which launched an attack on ABN AMRO in 2007 that helped trigger the Dutch bank’s sale, has seen profits surge 73 percent but warned this year will be tougher.
The Children’s Investment Fund Management (UK) LLP reported profit available for sharing among members of 555.9 million pounds for the year to end-August 2008, up from 321.0 million pounds a year before.
The firm paid 484.3 million pounds to its charity CIFF (The Children’s Investment Fund Foundation), up from 271.4 million pounds a year before.
Florida Times-Union – CSX Corp.’s proxy fight with two hedge funds ended in September with four nominees from The Children’s Investment Fund Management LLP and 3G Capital Partners Ltd. winning election to CSX’s board.
But even though the fight is long over, it continues to be in the news.
Last week, Securities and Exchange Commission Chairwoman Mary Schapiro told a U.S. Senate subcommittee that the commission is considering new disclosure rules on equity swap arrangements. According to a Bloomberg News story, the SEC’s examination of equity swaps is a direct result of CSX’s battle with TCI and 3G.
Bloomberg – The Children’s Investment Fund Management UK LLP, a $9.5 billion U.K. hedge fund, cut its short positions in Japanese stocks including Toshiba Corp. by almost $1 billion in less than two months, exchange filings show.
The London-based fund, also known as TCI, had about $248 million worth of short positions in 12 Japanese stocks, data based on exchange filings compiled by Bloomberg show, compared with about $1.2 billion on April 3.
TCI reduced its short positions in eight of 13 stocks including Sharp Corp., Japan’s biggest maker of liquid-crystal- display televisions, and Mizuho Financial Group Inc., Japan’s second-biggest bank by revenue, according to filings since April.
Bloomberg – The Children’s Investment Fund Management UK LLP, a $9.5 billion London-based hedge fund, has about $1.2 billion of short positions in Japanese stocks including Toshiba Corp., according to exchange filings.
The fund, better known as TCI, has shorted 13 Japanese stocks, data based on exchange filings compiled by Bloomberg show. Mizuho Financial Group Inc., Japan’s second-biggest bank by revenue, and Sony Corp., the world’s second-biggest consumer- electronics maker, are also among the short positions.
The bets against Japanese stocks by activist fund TCI, which lost a proxy battle with Japanese utility Electric Power Development Co. last year, come as the Nikkei 225 Stock Average completed its worst fiscal year since March 2001, losing 35 percent. TCI’s fund fell 43 percent in 2008, as global hedge funds were battered by client withdrawals and the worst market losses since the 1930s.
MSN India – The Children’s Investment Fund Management and its affiliates have emerged as the single-largest seller of Indian stocks among foreign institutional investors (FIIs).
The hedge fund registered its biggest annual loss in 2008.
The fund is liquidating its investments in India at a steep discount to the prices at which it bought the stocks last year. The Bombay Stock Exchange Sensitive Index has declined 15.4 per cent this year while the Bankex, the banking index, has lost 33.4 per cent.
The UK-based hedge fund accounts for about 10 per cent of an estimated Rs 10,772 crore of stock sales by FIIs so far this year. So far, Children’s Fund has sold as much as Rs 1,154 crore worth of stocks, or 33 per cent of its purchases last year, a study by the Business Standard Research Bureau showed.
Bloomberg – Children’s Investment Fund Management UK LLP, the London-based hedge fund founded by Christopher Cooper-Hohn, sold off its shares in Mastercard Inc. and added shares of rival credit-card network Visa Inc. in the fourth quarter.
Children’s sold its 5.95 million shares, valued at $963 million on Sept. 30, of Mastercard, based in Purchase, New York. The fund bought 4.7 million shares in San Francisco-based Visa, increasing the value of its stake to $589 million as of Dec. 31, according to a filing today with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
