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.
ninemsn – The corporations watchdog has extended a ban on covered short selling in the local equities market by at least another month because market conditions continue to be difficult.
But a group representing hedge funds, which are high volume users of the short selling trading technique, has condemned the move, saying it could lead to job losses.
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) imposed the ban on September 21, as financial markets were racked by volatility and regulators began to look for ways to reduce wild swing in certain shares and the wider market.
ASIC chairman Tony D’Aloisio said on Tuesday that various actions and packages adopted by the Australian and other world governments to address the global financial crisis were yet to work through the system.
Bloomberg – U.S. regulators are investigating whether investors manipulated end-of-day stock prices to avoid being forced by their brokers to sell holdings.
These gaps, which caused the Dow Jones Industrial Average to swing as much as 104 points this month in the final minute of trading, suggest investment firms faced with client redemptions and plunging markets may be gaming the closing-auction system. The discrepancies spurred the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, which oversees 5,000 brokerages, to look for evidence that investors are improperly swaying prices.
General Electric Co., McDonald’s Corp. and the 28 other Dow companies swung 0.6 percent on average at the close the last two weeks, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s almost eight times greater than the average three months ago. Because of the swings, the New York Stock Exchange plans to distribute information on the closing auction more often to help mitigate volatility.
Bloomberg – The Artradis AB2 fund, run by Singapore’s biggest hedge-fund firm, gained 4.96 percent in September, when Asian equities had their worst month in 18 years, two people with knowledge of its performance said.
The $2.2 billion hedge fund, managed by the firm’s co- founders Stephen Diggle and Richard Magides, returned 20.64 percent in the first nine months of the year, the people said, asking not to be identified because details are private. Asia’s hedge-fund average returns fell 16.2 percent this year, the region’s worst annual performance, according to Singapore-based data provider Eurekahedge.
Hedge funds such as those run by Artradis Fund Management Pte, which manages more than $4 billion, tend to outperform when markets are falling because they trade on volatility, which increases when prices decline. The 30-day volatility of the MSCI Asia-Pacific Index, a gauge of the average fluctuation of 990 stocks, has almost tripled to 55 percent, from 21 percent at the end of August.
Cay Compass – Turmoil caused by the US financial meltdown will likely effect Cayman’s hedge fund industry.
Leader of Government Business Kurt Tibbetts acknowledged at the Cabinet press briefing Friday that Cayman’s economy “does not operate in isolation and that we are not immune from the global volatility and uncertainty”.
Although Mr. Tibbetts said preliminary consultations with the financial industry indicated the retail banking sector was not experiencing any problems, the story was different for other key aspects of the sector.
“The areas that are expected to suffer most are those connected with hedge funds and structured finance,” he said. “Current global market conditions in the hedge fund arena are characterized by heavy redemptions, suspensions and re–structurings coupled with much–reduced… new fund formations.”
CNBC – Given the troubles in the market, we’re all worried about losing a chunk of our savings, whether it’s wrapped up in mutual funds, hedge funds or individual stocks. But how do you know when to bail on your fund (or fund manager) instead of just sticking out the volatility? Carmen offered some guidelines on Wednesday for distressed investors wondering when’s the right time to get out.
If you’re invested in a mutual fund, you’re probably seeing losses across the board. It’s important to look at the fund relative to other benchmarks, though, not just how it is performing against the Dow Industrials. If your fund has lost 10% or more relative to rival funds, Carmen suggested it might be time to pull the plug.
For hedge funds, be aware that it takes more time to redeem your investments. Do a gut check, Carmen said. If you feel uneasy about how your money is performing, that’s a sign. Trust your instincts as well as the overall performance of the fund.
Forbes – Lobbyists for the $2 trillion hedge fund industry made a last ditch effort Wednesday to convince U.S. securities regulators to let an emergency order prohibiting short selling in more than 950 financial firms expire Thursday.
"The orders have not prevented price declines of financial institutions, volatility in the securities of these firms, or the failure of a financial institution," said Richard Baker, president of hedge fund lobby group Managed Funds Association.
Baker said the emergency orders have increased volatility, reduced liquidity and abruptly halted capital-raising, including through the issuance of convertible securities.
But a number of securities law experts expect the Securities and Exchange Commission to extend the ban beyond Thursday because of the current fragile state of the markets.
Under the SEC emergency measures, short selling in the U.S.-listed financial firms stocks has been prohibited for about two weeks.
Professional Pensions – RMB Asset Management has launched a diversified target fund in a bid to help schemes manage funding volatility.
The asset management firm said the multi-manager RMB Diversified Target Return Fund has exposure to equities, bonds and alternatives such as commodities, hedge fund of funds and property.
It is aimed at both defined benefit and defined contribution pension schemes – and is targeting return of LIBOR (London interbank offered rate) plus 3pc over rolling three year periods.
The underlying managers are researched and monitored by RMB’s multi-manager research team which is headed up by chief executive officer Tom Joy.
Financial Post – The Canadian hedge fund industry has ballooned in the past few years, with some estimating annual growth at 30%. But there is still plenty of room for more, given that plenty of the strategies, such as risk arbitrage, that have proliferated in London and New York have not yet arrived here.
A near full house at yesterday’s Canadian Hedge Fund Managers Speak With Investors forum demonstrated that the industry, now pegged at about 200 separate funds in Canada, is alive and well regardless of the recent turmoil. Much of this is being driven by institutional investment.
Despite so much volatility in the markets in the past two months, and the fact that some feel fundamentals have "gone out the window," Canadian hedge fund managers at the forum, owing perhaps to having less leverage than their U. S. counterparts, remain upbeat. "The response from investors was outstanding. They are looking for some understanding and this is a perfect venue for that," said Karen Azlen, CEO of Introduction Capital, who organized the event.
Reuters – Asia’s hedge fund industry, one of the world’s worst performers even before the latest surge in volatility, will see a major shake-out as the global financial turmoil shuts down a huge swath of managers.
Few in the industry will guess at how many of an estimated 1,200 Asia-Pacific-focused hedge funds will fold in the months ahead. But higher losses and rising redemptions suggest things will be proportionately worse than for U.S. and European funds, they warned.
"This is a watershed for the industry … a lot of players are not going to be here by early next year. Those with high leverage and many smaller players will be gone," said Low Jeng-tek, the Asia head of UK-based fund of hedge funds manager Gems Advisors, which oversees more than $7 billion.
CNNMoney.com – Wall Street equity traders usually thrive on volatility, but the latest arrival of carnage on their doorstep has distracted and confounded them.
This habitually brusque bunch is even more harried than usual, worrying about their livelihoods and the safety of their funds’ accounts in addition to the direction of a crazy market. One prominent form of escape: gallows humor.
Asked what floor he was going to in an office complex in Jersey City, N.J., an employee of one major brokerage replied, "I might as well go up to your floor, and apply for a job. It looks like we’re next."
Even the diehard speculators in the hedge-fund community are in a state of confusion. The funds have watched two of the prime brokerages that serve them collapse and another get swallowed by a bank in a few months, and some are close to sticking money under a mattress, said Lorenzo Di Mattia, manager of hedge fund Sibilla Global Fund. Some funds are too busy working out where to put their account to even bother with securities or commodities.
Bloomberg.com: Asia – Nippon Life Insurance Co., Japan’s biggest life insurer, said it will boost hedge fund investments and may target distressed assets to take advantage of volatility caused by the collapse of the U.S. subprime mortgage market.
Nippon Life, with about 100 billion yen ($920 million) in hedge funds, increased its allocation to this asset class by about 30 billion yen during the past two years in a trend it intends to continue, Hideya Sadanaga, deputy general manager of the firm’s Credit & Alternative Investment Department, said in an interview in Tokyo.
The global credit crisis that’s caused more than $500 billion of losses and writedowns at financial firms has increased volatility in debt markets and led to a 20 percent decline in the value of the 1,737 companies on the MSCI World Index this year.
Myrtle Beach Online – The deflating commodities bubble is claiming its first casualties as large investment funds absorb staggering losses from bad bets that prices for oil, precious metals and grains would keep going up.
Hedge fund operator Ospraie Management LLC notified investors Tuesday that it’s closing its flagship fund after it suffered losses in August on positions in energy, mining and other natural resource-related stocks that left the fund down nearly 40 percent year-to-date. It’s believed to be the first hedge fund to go bust in this latest commodities boom as prices come crashing down after a historic bull-run earlier this year.
And the bloodletting may have only begun. Wall Street analysts say similar trouble looms for other funds that got caught up in the exuberance of the boom but were too late in getting out.
They say Ospraie’s misfortunes illustrate one of the hard lessons emerging from the commodities bubble: Many money managers have never been through a commodities boom and so were ill-prepared for the hyper-volatility associated with hard assets.
"You’re always going to have victims when a market comes down this fast. People stayed at the party for too long," said Phil Flynn, energy analyst at Alaron Trading Corp. in Chicago.
