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.
Bloomberg – John Paulson, the hedge-fund manager whose wagers against the U.S. housing market helped him earn an estimated $2.5 billion last year, bought Bank of America Corp. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. stock in the second quarter, while adding to stakes in gold companies.
His firm, Paulson and Co., bought 168 million shares of Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America valued at $2.2 billion as of June 30, according to a filing yesterday with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. It was the biggest new purchase in the second quarter for Paulson, 53, and made him the bank’s fourth-largest owner.
Bloomberg – Boaz Weinstein, the bond trader who lost more than $1 billion last year at Deutsche Bank AG, has raised about $160 million since the end of April for his new hedge fund, according to two people familiar with the matter.
Saba Capital Management LP, based in New York, plans to start trading in August, said a third person with knowledge of the firm. The people asked not to be identified because the information is private.
Saba, Hebrew for grandfather, was the name of the credit unit Weinstein started at Frankfurt-based Deutsche Bank in 2001. Weinstein, 35, lost money in 2008 after betting on bonds of companies such as Ford Motor Co. and hedging some of those wagers with credit-default swaps, contracts to protect against or speculate on default, people familiar with the matter said in January when the plans to start his own fund were made public.
Bloomberg – Octagon Capital Management Pte, run by former managers of the Government of Singapore Investment Corp.’s quantitative-investment group, plans to start a fund that seeks to profit from broad economic trends.
Octagon, which uses computer models to pick trades, will raise money “in the near future” for a quantitative macro fund that wagers on currencies, equities, interest rates and commodities in Asia, said Lam Poh Min, 39, co-founder of the Singapore-based hedge-fund firm, in an interview. The firm is looking for a “more opportune time” to start the fund, Lam said yesterday.
West Palm Beach (HedgeCo.Net)- So far this summer, with only some slight exaggeration, Iraq could comparatively be portrayed as a stable, safe & secure place, according to the Fact Sheet for June 2008 for the Iraqi Babylon Fund.
Relative calmness characterized Babylon Fund’s performance in June, mainly trading sideway with a modest 0.6% performance in the red at closing. Most of the fund’s sectors, asset classes and portfolio holdings experienced calm waters, except for the internationally traded oil companies whose volatility increased significantly.
The overall portfolio strategy has allowed the Iraqi fund to stay in positive territory through the year, with a +1.7% performance on a YTD basis. In anticipation of increased riskadjusted returns on the medium-term we continue to add to our Iraqi
The Babylon Fund is an open-ended mutual fund investing into large-cap Iraqi-dependant securities, mainly listed on the Iraqi stock exchange in Baghdad, but also in other countries.
Seattle Times- The House on Wednesday approved a plan to protect more than 20 million families from an expensive levy called the alternative minimum tax (AMT) while raising taxes on hedge-fund managers and oil companies. But the measure has little hope of Senate passage, Senate leaders said.
The House voted 233-189 to prevent the AMT from expanding next April to ensnare millions of middle-class taxpayers, adding thousands of dollars to their tax bills.
To replace the lost revenue, more than $61.5 billion, the House agreed to more than double the tax rate on income from investment-services partnerships such as hedge funds, to deny oil and gas companies a lucrative deduction for domestic production, and to require credit-card companies to report their transactions with retailers to the Internal Revenue Service, among other provisions.
CNNMoney.com- Oil and natural gas prices have soared to new highs this year, but most energy hedge funds are having trouble turning a profit in their trades.
Energy hedge fund managers interviewed by Hedge Fund Trades cited various reasons for their weak performance this year. Some have been on the wrong side of oil prices swings, while others have suffered from positions in oil companies and refiners that produced lackluster returns.
