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.
Caribbean Net News – The trustee liquidating Bernard Madoff’s business told a judge that two Cayman Islands and Bermuda hedge-fund firms accused of profiting from the fraud are ignoring his lawsuits seeking a total of $230.7 million in damages.
Trustee Irving Picard on Wednesday asked the US Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan to file default notices against the Cayman Islands-based Primeo Fund and Bermuda-based Alpha Prime Fund Ltd., court papers show. Two offshore firms sued earlier for a total of $1.2 billion also have ignored Picard’s lawsuits.
Times Online – The Massachusetts Pension Reserves Investment Management Board, which oversees $38 billion, voted to fire hedge-fund firm Austin Capital Management after losing $12 million with alleged Ponzi scheme operator Bernard Madoff.
The state pension board also decided at a meeting in Boston today to dismiss Ivy Asset Management, the hedge-fund unit of Bank of New York Mellon Corp., because several senior managers have left the firm. About $430 million in pension assets were invested with Ivy and $130 million with Austin, the board said.
Austin invested pension assets with Tremont Partners, the hedge-fund unit of Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co. Tremont placed money through its Rye Select Broad Market Prime Fund LP with Madoff, the New York financier accused of fraud in a scheme that may have cost clients $50 billion.
International Herald Tribune – The mergers and acquisitions business is about to take a deep dive.
For most of the financial crisis, it has remained surprisingly buoyant. This was partly because there was a lot of business to be done selling troubled banks like Merrill Lynch, HBOS and Fortis.
There was also the overhang of deals from the bubble era. But in the past week, two such megadeals – the miner BHP Billiton’s hostile bid for a rival, Rio Tinto, and the planned leveraged buyout of Bell Canada – have come apart at the seams.
As the financing squeeze tightens, other deals could follow suit.
Financing Verizon Wireless’s acquisition of Alltel is proving to be a strain. Verizon Wireless has issued bonds and is looking to raise some bank debt. But the company may have to pay a high price.
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.”
Fortis has closed three small hedge funds in the aftermath of its acquisition of part of ABN Amro and merger of the Belgian and Dutch banks’ asset management operations, according to a report in the Financial Times.
The Fortis European long/short fund, which had €120m ($167m) under administration, was shut after the decision to rope in the ABN European equity team, led by Andrew King.
The convertible arbitrage fund was shut in order to free up staff to focus on the enlarged long-only convertible bond funds. The final fund, a US long/short fund, was shut at the end of last year, the FT report said.
Reuters – Belgian-Dutch financial services group Fortis said on Wednesday it had sold former ABN AMRO unit International Asset Management IAM.L as part of a strategy to bolster its balance sheet.
Fortis said in a statement it had sold London-based fund-of-hedge-funds manager IAM to its management, supported by certain third party investors.
The deal would not have a material impact on Fortis’ net profit per share but would give some solvency relief, it said.
Fortis two weeks ago announced a programme to shore up its finances by 8.3 billion euros (6.6 billion pounds), partly by selling assets, after buying parts of former rival ABN AMRO.
CNBC- Fortis NV. said it has sold its London-based hedge fund manager International Asset Management (IAM) to its management team, supported by third party investors, for an undisclosed sum.
The Belgian-Dutch bancassurer said the transaction will boost its solvency ratios, without specifying further, but will have no material impact on EPS.
The company was not immediately available for further comment.
IAM is one of the former units of ABN Amro Asset Management acquired by Fortis in the consortium takeover launched with RBS and Santander for the Dutch bank in 2007. On March 31, it had $4.3 billion of assets under management.
Reuters- Beleaguered Swiss bank UBS is considering the sale of Paine Webber, the heart of its U.S. wealth management business, according to sources with direct knowledge of the matter.
UBS is under pressure from the Swiss financial watchdog and from one of its top shareholders, Olivant, to overhaul its business after more than $37 billion (18 billion pounds) in writedowns during the credit turmoil.
The bank’s management, led by Chief Executive Marcel Rohner, is also grappling with the U.S. trial of a former employee for helping a billionaire client hide $200 million.
U.S. Daily- Belgian-Dutch financial services group Fortis received $630 million in capital from Russian billionaire Suleiman Kerimov as part of its recent share issue, the Wall Street Journal said, citing people familiar with the matter.
Fortis, which last week raised 1.5 billion euros ($2.4 billion) from the heavily discounted share issue, secured the money from Kerimov’s Swiss-based investment vehicle, Millennium Group, as part of the share issue, the people told the newspaper.
