New York (HedgeCo.net) – In a letter first made public by Reuters today to Galleon employees and clients, Raj Rajaratnam, who has been released on bail, said “I have decided that it is now in the best interest of our investors and employees to conduct an orderly wind down of Galleon’s funds while we explore various alternatives for our business.”

His bail was set at $100 million.  He said,  regarding  the charges, that, “they are, without exception, entirely baseless. I am innocent and will vigorously defend myself and our firm.”

“The privilege of managing investors’ capital is a responsibility that I have always taken very seriously.  I want to reiterate that I am innocent of all charges and will defend myself against these accusations with the same intensity and focus I have brought to managing our investors’ capital.” Rajartnam concluded.

Alex Akesson
Editor for HedgeCo.net
alex@hedgeco.net
HedgeCo.Net is a premier hedge fund database and community for qualified and accredited investors only. Membership in HedgeCo.net is FREE and EASY. We also offer FREE LISTINGS for Hedge Funds!

Tags: accredited-investors, accusations, hedge fund, hedge funds, investors capital

New York Times – Investors who expected hedge funds to prune fees after a particularly disastrous showing in 2008 may be disappointed by a recent study.

The Wall Street Journal reported that a study compiled by the French fund-of-hedge-funds firm Olympia Capital Management found that for the most part, fees remained steady at the 2,659 funds it analyzed. It also found that only a handful of the firms had shortened the time between one redemption date to the next, or reduced the initial lockup period they place on investors’ capital.

Last year, the average fund lost nearly 19 percent, and investors flooded firms with withdrawal requests. More than $600 billion has been pulled from hedge funds since the peak of the credit boom, leaving the industry to oversee just $1.3 trillion, according to Hedge Fund Research.

Read Complete Article

Tags: fund-of-hedge-funds, investors capital, lockup period

Boston Globe – The Massachusetts state pension fund fired two money managers yesterday for poor performance, including one that had lost $12 million investing with accused swindler Bernard L. Madoff.

Austin Capital Management, which had managed $170 million in state retirement funds, was fired after it lost $40 million, including the money invested with Madoff and $28 million from market declines. The state withdrew its remaining $130 million from Austin, which runs a "fund of funds," a middleman that takes investors’ capital and spreads it among other money managers, including hedge funds.

Read Complete Article

Tags: boston globe, capital-management, investors capital, madoff, massachusetts state, middleman, money-managers, poor-performance, retirement funds, state retirement, state-pension-fund

trackback from your site.