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.
Sydney Morning Herald – The hedge fund industry says it supports federal government plans to ban naked short selling and impose a disclosure regime for covered short selling.
The Australian arm of the Alternative Investment Management Association (AIMA) said the group had been in talks with regulators and the federal government about legislation to go to parliament on Thursday.
But while it supported the naked short selling ban, moves to create greater transparency of covered short selling activity on the Australian stock exchange did not go far enough.
Sydney Morning Herald – BNP Paribas SA, France’s biggest bank, agreed to take control of Fortis in Belgium and Luxembourg for 14.5 billion euros ($26 billion), completing a breakup of the lender after a government rescue failed.
BNP Paribas will pay 9 billion euros in stock and 5.5 billion euros in cash for 75% of Fortis Bank Belgium, all of the Belgian insurance operations and 67% of Fortis’s bank in Luxembourg, the Paris-based bank said in a e-mailed statement today. Fortis’s risky assets will be split off into a separate entity.
“It means excellent conditions for buying a network with a government guaranty,” said Emmanuel Soupre, a fund manager who helps oversee about $31 billion, including BNP Paribas shares, at Neuflize OBC Asset Management in Paris. “It’s like buying a home with all the works at the expenses of the old landlord.”
Sydney Morning Herald- The ownership structure of some of Australia’s largest mining companies could be set for a major change after New York hedge fund Harbinger Capital Partners has indicated it believes commodities prices could be nearing their peak.
Harbinger, which has substantial stakes in Australian miners Fortescue Metals, Murchison Metals, Midwest and Moly Mines, has emerged as an opponent of US iron ore miner Cleveland-Cliffs’ proposed $US10 billion acquisition of coalminer Alpha Natural Resources.
Cliffs – which has an 85 per cent stake in West Australian iron ore miner Portman Mining – wants to merge with Alpha to form a more diversified supplier to the steel industry. But Harbinger, which owns 18.4 per cent of Cliffs, has told the US Securities and Exchange Commission it believes the deal is "not in the best interest of shareholders".
Sydney Morning Herald- The waste management business Transpacific has attempted to snuff out concerns about its ability to service its $2.6 billion of debts, arguing that the market has failed to recognise its "incredible cash flow" and the value of its landfill sites.
After spending six months appeasing investor concerns over the group’s debt exposure, the executive chairman, Terry Peabody, said landfill sites were "another great asset of the company that I don’t think very many people realise".
He told ABC TV’s Inside Business that Transpacific could realise up to $100 million from its 26 hectare Tullamarine tip in Melbourne, which has come to the end of its life.
Sydney Morning Herald- There should be no doubt in anyone’s mind that those aggressive funds we all love to hate were responsible for the massive fall in Babcock & Brown’s share price yesterday – a fall so large it prompted a "review" by the company’s banks of its corporate debt facility.
There is also no doubt B&B provides a fertile environment for the hedge funds to operate. B&B and many of its satellite investment companies are vulnerable because they are over-geared, with flawed business models.
