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.
New York Times Blogs – The inquiry into corruption at the New York State pension fund started simply enough. Alan G. Hevesi, the former comptroller, was accused of using state workers as chauffeurs for his ailing wife.
But by the time Mr. Hevesi resigned his office in late 2006, investigators for the Albany County district attorney’s office were examining a more troubling problem: allegations that Mr. Hevesi’s associates had sold access to the state’s $122 billion pension fund, using one of the world’s largest pools of assets to reward friends, pay back political favors and reap millions of dollars in cash rewards for themselves, The New York Times’s Danny Hakim and Mary Williams Walsh reported.
Bloomberg – Compensation for U.S. hedge-fund employees may drop as much as 25 percent this year as the firms try to recoup last year’s investment losses.
The decline will cut hedge-fund paychecks to about half the record levels of 2007, according to estimates by Alan Johnson, founder of Johnson Associates Inc., a New York-based compensation-consulting firm whose clients include financial- services companies.
About 70 percent of the industry’s 6,800 so-called single- manager funds lost money in 2008 with the average fund dropping 19 percent, according to data compiled by Chicago-based Hedge Fund Research Inc. That means most clients don’t have to pay performance fees — generally 20 percent of profits — until the losses are made up. Many owners of the private partnerships will cover salaries out of their own pockets, or from pools set aside in previous years, to keep their best employees, Johnson said.
The Washington Times – Year after year, the hedge fund industry dazzled Wall Street by delivering "absolute returns" – outsized profits whether markets rose or fell. Using sophisticated trading models, the pools of managed capital made wealthy people wealthier with eyepopping returns that carried seemingly moderate risk.
Not these days. Blindsided by a colossal market collapse and the widening Bernard Madoff scandal, hedge funds suffered their worst showing on record last year. And they’re bracing for more pain in 2009. The industry’s fall proves that even the quantitative brilliance and market wizardry of elite hedge funds are no magic bullet for investors during brutal times.
"Hedge fund managers have always said, ‘Look, we know how to make money even in difficult times,’ and that turns out to be a fallacy," said Timothy Brog, portfolio manager of New York-based hedge fund Locksmith Capital Management.
Daily Herald – Year after year, the hedge fund industry dazzled Wall Street by delivering "absolute returns" – outsized profits whether markets rose or fell. Using sophisticated trading models, the pools of managed capital made wealthy people wealthier with eye-popping returns that carried seemingly moderate risk.
Not these days. Blind-sided by a colossal market collapse and the widening Bernard Madoff scandal, hedge funds suffered their worst showing on record last year. And they’re bracing for more pain in 2009. The industry’s fall proves that even the quantitative brilliance and market wizardry of elite hedge funds are no magic bullet for investors during brutal times.
istockAnalyst.com – First it was the sovereign wealth funds, controlling vast portions of American companies. Then it was the private equity cowboys who came in and took public companies private, removing them from public investment – and scrutiny.
Finally, there were the hedge funds, large pools of private money moving the markets and making stunning returns at the expense of small investors.
Just like their predecessors, who have found that they aren’t as invincible as once believed, hedge funds are having a difficult year. Seven percent of all hedge funds closed in the first three quarters of 2008 – nearly 700 of them. That doesn’t even include the fourth quarter.
Tacoma News Tribune – Year after year, the hedge fund industry dazzled Wall Street by delivering “absolute returns” – outsized profits whether markets rose or fell. Using sophisticated trading models, the pools of managed capital made wealthy people wealthier with eye-popping returns that carried seemingly moderate risk.
Not these days. Blind-sided by a colossal market collapse and the widening Bernard Madoff scandal, hedge funds suffered their worst showing on record last year. And they’re bracing for more pain in 2009. The industry’s fall proves that even the quantitative brilliance and market wizardry of elite hedge funds are no magic bullet for investors during brutal times.
“Hedge fund managers have always said, ‘Look, we know how to make money even in difficult times,’ and that turns out to be a fallacy,” said Timothy Brog, portfolio manager of New York-based hedge fund Locksmith Capital Management.
This is Money – Perhaps you’ve been imagining that if Barack Obama becomes President of the US, he will impose tough new rules on Wall Street, sweep away the economic inequalities of the Bush years and demand that the gigantic banks that created the present mess are broken into a hundred powerless pieces. In which case, prepare to be disappointed.
On paper, the Democratic candidate sounds like a reformer.
He called the last Bush tax cuts exactly what they were: ‘The Paris Hilton tax break. It’s about giving billions of dollars to billionaire heirs and heiresses.’ Stirring stuff.
He claims that if elected he would increase the tax rate on capital gains to 25% and go after hedge-fund managers with venom.
Under Obama, the speculators would see gains on their income taxed at 35% rather then the measly 15% they currently enjoy. Other corporate taxes are also supposed to rise.
In practice he is unlikely to do any of those things for one simple reason: Wall Street owns him. Each year The Centre for Public Integrity in Washington DC compiles a list of the donors to top politicians for its annual book The Buying of The President.
Financial Times- Even as politicians and regulators accuse hedge fund short-sellers of trying to bring down banks in Britain, the US and Australia, top hedge managers are providing rescue capital to prop up the ailing corporate world.
The latest bail-out backed by hedge funds is the £4.5bn cash raising by Britain’s Barclays, where five big managers are ready to provide just under 10 per cent of the new money – with sovereign wealth funds providing the majority of the rest.
Hedge funds are important backers of the current wave of rights issues, too, according to investment bankers close to the deals. In spite of publicly-declared short positions – where hedge funds hope to profit from falling prices – several big hedge funds are sub-underwriting the rescue rights issue by HBOS, the biggest mortgage lender, guaranteeing to buy the shares if the rights are not taken up.
"Although equity underwriting currently looks difficult, hedge fund participation in this market has increased as their asset base has grown," says Jim Renwick, vice-chairman at UBS. "This has been the case for more than five years now."
