Hedge Fund Industry Intelligence

The Philadelphia Inquirer

Chicago-based alternative in investment firm Victory Park Capital (VPC) has appointed John Martin as senior advisor. Based in Chicago, Martin will support VPC’s private credit strategies, leveraging his thirty years of experience in the investment industry.

Retail Gazette

Reuters

finews.asia

Traders Magazine

South China Morning Post

The CFA Institute, in conjunction with the African Stock Exchanges Association (ASEA), has put together a book on the challenges and opportunities in the African capital markets. In Africa as elsewhere, fortune favors the bold. For example—and this is not an example from the ASEA and CFA Institute’s book—the EnkoRead More

The Business Times

The Age

Laxman Pai, Opalesque Asia: According to Fidelity Investments ' 2020 New Year Financial Resolutions Study, 84% of individuals said they would prefer to reduce their debts than lower their computer or phone screen time. Reducing debt emerged as a prominent focus throughout this year's study, with 38...

Laxman Pai, Opalesque Asia: 43% of the U.S. investors interested in Bitcoin are women, according to a survey from Bitcoin fund operator Grayscale. Within that segment, a further 80% were intrigued by Bitcoin's growth potential and even more significantly, the vast majority (93%) indicated that they...

In the week ending December 13th 2019, two brand name names funds are going opposite directions, at least performance wise: Maverick Capital posted explosive results in November, far exceeding the performance of most hedge funds. As a result, the firm, which had been faltering somewhat since a stro...

Another year of hedge funds not earning their keep From Star Tribune: A typical hedge fund requires that any interested buyer first meet the definition of an "accredited investor." That usually means a person who earns at least $250,000 per year or has net worth of at least $5 m...

Coca-Cola's corporate venturing platform, Amatil X, has collaborated with Artesian Venture Partners on a multi-million dollar fund for new start-ups. The program is targeting start-ups that deliver value for customers, strengthening the beverage bottler's capabilities and growth opportunities. Co...

The bull market almost no one saw coming From Bloomberg: Hedge your holdings. Stay defensive. Figure out a risk tolerance and don't buy anything that keeps you up at night. All the investment advice at the tail end of the financial crisis came with a huge dollop of caution. So at the start of th...

New York State Common moves nearly $1.5bn to managers From PIonline.com: The New York State Common Retirement Fund, Albany, made investments of $1 billion in two new separate accounts and four commitments worth $487.6 million, according to information posted on the website of Thomas DiNapoli, the...

Toscafund scoops up 12% of troubled retailer Ted Baker From FT: A hedge fund run by one of the City's most aggressive managers has taken a stake of nearly 12 per cent in troubled retailer Ted Baker, intensifying speculation about its future. Toscafund Asset Management emerged as a significant ...

From Institutional Investor: The Teacher Retirement System of Texas has named deputy CIO Jase Auby as its chief investment officer, replacing Jerry Albright at the state's largest public pension fund. Auby joined the retirement system in 2009, according to a statement Friday from TRS. Albright, w...

What miner capitulation? Bitcoin miners confident in price prospects From News BTC: If you have perused Bitcoin and Crypto Twitter at all over the past few weeks, you've likely seen the term "miner capitulation" mentioned again and again. You see, over the past few months, th...

Hedge funds grow more bullish on coffee as Brazil's reserves vanish From Business Times: Top coffee supplier Brazil is running out of reserves, and investors are taking note. In the season ending Sept 30, Brazilian reserves may plummet to the lowest since at least in 1962, when US government reco...

There's no better place to put your money than in the U.S., says hedge-fund manager Kyle Bass From Market Watch: We may be roughly 11 trading sessions from the end of the year, but lately it's been feeling more like 100. Investors are scanning the horizons for developments on Sunday's deadline fo...

Woodford's bet on U.K. Plc comes good too late for investors From Yahoo: The rally inspired by the U.K. Conservative Party's election victory has come too late for Neil Woodford, whose former flagship fund is being liquidated just as his bets on small and mid-sized U.K. firms start to pay off. ...

China to improve capital market governance From Xinhua: China's top securities regulator plans to improve governance of the capital market as part of major tasks for 2020. The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) said it would work to develop a capital market with more standardized rules...

US singer Taylor Swift slams private equity for 'buying up' her music From SCMP: Taylor Swift renewed her criticism of private equity, calling out the Carlyle Group and the Soros family for helping her nemesis Scooter Braun purchase the rights to her old music. In a speech at a Billboard Women...

Villains or visionaries? Hedge funds short companies they say 'greenwash' From Reuters: Tens of trillions of global investment dollars are pouring into companies touting robust environmental, social and governance credentials. Now short-sellers spy an opportunity. Such hedge funds, often cast ...

Shareholder activism rises in Japan as firms go hostile and investors speak out From Japan Times: Record shareholder activism is combining with rare hostile takeover bids in Japan, in a trend that's seen as good news for investors in the country's $6.2 trillion stock market. Activists such as ...

Hedge fund now second-biggest shareholder behind departed chief executive Ray Kelvin

HedgeWeek –The Eurekahedge Crypto-Currency Hedge Fund Index was down 8.33 per cent in November, outperforming Bitcoin which ended the month down 16.21 per cent. Fund managers focusing on crypto-currencies are up 21.02 per cent over the first 11 months of 2019.

Reuters UK

The National

This is Money

Most hedge fund investors experienced strong gains on the back of a strong market performance, which certainly propelled them to adjust their equity holdings so as to maintain the desired risk ...

We are looking to generate superior returns for our readers. That's why we believe it isn't a waste of time to check out hedge fund sentiment before you invest in a stock like Granite Constructi The post appeared first on bing..

Minneapolis Star Tribune

Citadel Securities is sometimes dismissively referred to as "Citadel's trading arm" -- seen as a forgotten backwater of Ken Griffin's hedge fund empire, where quants toil on complex algorithms to ...

Bend Bulletin

Casino.Org News

JD Supra

Institutional Investor

Financial Post

Being Tesla’s top lawyer certainly seems hard from the outside. There are the tweets, and the subsequent lawsuits, and subsequent SEC negotiations, and subsequent lawsuits, and the tweets, and the subsequent lawsuits, and the subsequent difficulties in trial prep, and the tweets, and the ...

HedgeWeek

By Lisa Lewin, Business Development, Prime Services, BNY Mellon Pershing –We understand that our hedge fund clients face challenges when marketing to the RIA community. Providing a look inside the mind of the adviser is just one of the ways the Prime Services team at BNY Mellon’s Pershing can help fund managers build strategies to help grow their businesses.

Cowen has dramatically changed its presence in Europe and is aggressively investing in all of its businesses while the likes of Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse, and others continue to downsize their operations. In the Prime Brokerage and Outsourced Trading businesses, the firm is planning meaningful expansions for 2020 and beyond. In the former, this effort is aimed at filling the void being created by others, while in the latter the commitment is in response to a sharp increase in demand for such services.

Most hedge fund investors experienced strong gains on the back of a strong market performance, which certainly propelled them to adjust their equity holdings so as to maintain the desired risk profile ...

According to industry data provider Coalition, the world’s 12 largest investment banks produced USD18.3 billion in prime services revenue last year, up 8.3 per cent on 2017 but despite this the PB arena remains as gladiatorial as ever.

This special report looks at the challenges facing prime brokers including uncleared margin rules for non-cleared derivatives and how they are working to ensure pricing models evolve sufficiently in line with market developments to maintain profitability…

Institutional Investor

In June of last year, when Major League Baseball and Seidler Equity Partners bought Rawlings, the company that makes MLB’s balls, the move was heralded as a wondrous bit of corporate synergizing, and important to baseball’s very future. Remember two key lines from Maria Armental’s story in The Wall ...

Two years ago, JPMorgan Chase’s money-laundering operations received the most fulsome compliment imaginable, a slap on the wrist from the Swiss authorities. Now, however, that proud and august banking legacy has been reined in. The Federal Reserve on Thursday lifted consent orders against JPMorgan ...

BFD When he wasn’t busy throwing shade at a 16-year old, Donny Politics was doing what he does best on Thursday: closing deals. “VERY BIG DEAL” Just after markets opened, Trump tweeted “Getting VERY close to a BIG DEAL with China. They want it, and so do we!” Ok Donny, we’ve heard that before. ...

Financial Post

We are looking to generate superior returns for our readers. That's why we believe it isn't a waste of time to check out hedge fund sentiment before you invest in a stock like Atlas Air Worldwide ...

PIMCO has launched the PIMCO Enhanced Short Maturity Active ESG Exchange-Traded Fund (EMNT), which aims to offer higher income than traditional cash investments, with a modest increase in risk, and focuses on issuers with high quality environmental, social and governance (ESG) practices.

HedgeWeek

Jamie Stuttard, Head of Global Macro Fixed Income Team at Robeco, comments on the UK election result…

JP Morgan Asset Management has appointed Meg McClellan as Head of Private Credit in the firm's Global Alternatives group, effective 1 January, 2020, to lead the firm's major expansion in Private Credit.

The Wilshire Liquid Alternative Index, which provides a representative baseline for how the broad liquid alternative investment category performs, returned 0.57 per cent in November, underperforming the 1.03 per cent monthly return of the HFRX Global Hedge Fund Index.

Finance Magnates

Mondaq News Alerts

Reuters UK

In a new paper, three quants with Robeco suggest that the “short” side of the activity of many long/short equity trades is pointless. These quants are David Blitz, Guido Baltussen, who is also affiliated with Erasmus University, Rotterdam, and Pim Van Vliet. They have broken down the common equity factorRead More

B. G., Opalesque Geneva: As of July this year, about 66%, or $861bn, of total worldwide hedge fund assets were controlled by the 25 largest managers and 41% by the 10 top firms (Bridgewater, Renaissance, Man, AQR, Two Sigma, Millennium, Elliott, BlackRock, Citadel and Davidson Kempner) according to ...

Laxman Pai, Opalesque Asia: Meg McClellan was named managing director and head of private credit at J.P. Morgan Asset Management. It is a newly created position, said the asset manager with $146 billion in alternative assets under management. Ms. McClellan, whose new role is effective Jan. 1, will l...

Laxman Pai, Opalesque Asia: The credit rating agency Moody's Investors Service said that most of the largest 25 US cities would be able to weather a recession of similar severity as the 2008-09 downturn without a material adverse credit impact. The rating agency 's analysis shows that 17 of the 25 c...

From Institutional Investor: The hedge fund industry is sticking closer to passive benchmarks, and alpha has declined as a result, according to research from the University of Virginia. In the 15 years leading up to 2008, the average hedge fund manager could be expected to deliver excess returns, ne...

CapStreet strikes $500m hard cap for fifth flagship fund close The CapStreet Group, a Houston, Texas based private equity firm that invests in privately held, lower middle-market companies, today announced the final closing of CapStreet V, L.P. at its hard cap, with total commitments of $500 mill...

South Carolina earmarks $370m for 6 alts funds From PIonline.com: South Carolina Retirement System Investment Commission, Columbia, committed up to $370 million to six funds for the $32.2 billion South Carolina Retirement Systems' investment portfolio, according to board documents published Thurs...

Investor's Business Daily

George Soros hedge fund makes bet against Daily Mail owner shares From The Guardian: The hedge fund owned by the billionaire investor and anti-Brexit donor George Soros has made a pound;16m bet against shares in the owner of the Daily Mail newspaper. SFM UK Management, the London arm of the New...

Citadel hires Tripp Kyle as chief corporate affairs officer From Reuters: Citadel has hired Tripp Kyle to lead the $32 billion investment firm's public relations effort as its chief corporate affairs and communications officer. Kyle, a communications industry veteran, joins Citadel from Millenni...

Countries vie for cryptocurrency supremacy as Libra tips scales From FT: Mark Zuckerberg had barely settled into his seat in front of the US House of Representatives financial services committee in October when the grilling began. No niceties were afforded the Facebook chief executive. Very qui...

Pennsylvania dumps dozens of hedge funds in cost-cutting move From Inquirer: Pennsylvania Treasurer Joe Torsella last month told the world he'd pulled the state's money - or at least the slice he oversees - "out of all so-called hedge-fund investments, resulting in [over] $14 million in ...

From Global Capital: After assembling mega funds that can commit loans of euro;1bn and more, direct lenders are gaining ground in leveraged finance at notable speed. Besides size, firms such as Alcentra, Ares, BlueBay and ICG offer borrowers privacy, speed, fixed terms and long-term commitment. But...

Watch out, China: Why investors may flock to India next From Institutional Investor: With China shrouded in political and economic uncertainty, it's time to invest in India. That's according to a white paper expected to be released this week from alternative investment firm Investcorp, which argu...

From City Wire: Emerging markets is the 2020 horse to back in the equity space, according to a test of sentiment conducted by NN Investment Partners. Despite ongoing headwinds from the US-China trade conflict and rising social unrest, investors have backed the developing world as the prospects of a ...

Private equity bets on health care real estate From Fox: While private equity investors look for new ways to generate returns on their cash, one sector they appear to be turning their attention to is health care real estate - snapping up everything from medical offices to senior living spaces. A...

Big investors turn screw over climate pollution disclosure From FT: Many of the world's biggest investors have long supported calls for companies to spell out their carbon emissions. But a growing number of large asset managers are going a step further, warning they will actively punish board exe...

From FA Mag: The SEC will vote next week on broadening the definition of "accredited investor" to allow more investors to partake in private, unregistered investments, including hedge funds. The Securities and Exchange Commission plans to consider the amendments to the Securities A...

The hedge fund CQS is looking at unloved parts of the credit market for 2020 From Barrons: The hedge fund CQS is starting to wade into beaten-down sectors of the credit market. In the firm's 2020 outlook, Sir Michael Hintze, founder of the credit fund, writes that many investors were too early in...

This is Money

Institutional Investor

City A.M.

Banking CIO Outlook

With primary filing deadlines flying past, we at Dealbreaker are slowly coming to a painful realization: While Mike Bloomberg is not going to be the next president of the United States, Jamie Dimon is not going to be, either, on account of his not running. (This also means that Marianne Lake is ...

Financial Advisor Magazine

Mack Cali Realty Corp (NYSE:CLI) shares haven't seen a lot of action during the third quarter. Overall, hedge fund sentiment was unchanged. The stock was in 13 hedge funds' portfolios at the end of ...

If you’re familiar with the hilarious escapades of Credit Suisse’s own Keystone Kops, you might surmise that the bungling efforts to keep an eye on former wealth-management chief Iqbal Khan were something of a one-off, a misbegotten scheme hatched by people unskilled in the arts of surveillance. To ...

Overall, hedge fund sentiment was unchanged. The stock was in 14 hedge funds' portfolios at the end of September. At the end of this article we will also compare AIMC to other stocks including SSR ...

MarketWatch

Barron's

Eyes on the Ties

RPMI Railpen (Railpen) has added three new supermarkets to its property portfolio – two Lidl stores, located in North West London and Kent, and an Aldi store in Scunthorpe.The trio of new supermarkets total over 59,000 sq ft (5,482 sq m) in retail space.

The Houston Astros are embroiled in a cheating scandal. It seems the quantitatively-minded McKinsey whiz kids who run the team and led it to a World Series championship two years ago and a second pennant this year’s bright idea was to put an illegal camera in center field to relay the catcher’s ...

iNVEZZ

Futures Magazine

FundRock Group has appointed Simon Gunson as Managing Director of its UK entity, FundRock Partners Ltd.

RJ O’Brien & Associates (RJO), an independent futures brokerage and clearing firm in the United States, has successfully implemented Itiviti’s Managed FIX Service.

The Philadelphia Inquirer

Following Maples Group’s biennial management elections, Jonathan Green has been appointed as the company’s new Global Managing Partner, with effect from 1 December 2019.

The Swiss Blockchain Federation has published guidelines for issuers of digital equity and related tokens aimed particularly at helping smaller and mid-sized companies to fully leverage the issuance and trading of equity on the blockchain.

As part of a wide ranging 2020 industry trend outlook, a survey of US asset managers and asset owners conducted by State Street Corporation predicts continued prevalence of digital assets as well as a bigger role in the industry for semi-transparent active ETFs.

Geopolitical risks & trade tensions rank as the greatest threat to global financial stability in 2020, according to a new survey published by The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC).

After two straight down months, the managed futures industry reversed course in November posting a 0.40 per cent monthly return, according to the Barclay CTA Index compiled by BarclayHedge. Year-to-date, CTA funds posted a 5.04 per cent return through the end of November.

By Gregory Marose –As hedge funds across the globe continue to face fee compression and performance headwinds, there’s a compelling rationale for managers to open up the equity activism playbook. Fund managers with the right expertise and resources can act as their own catalyst for value creation while showing current investors and prospective allocators that they’re able to generate alpha in a differentiated manner. There are even some potential tailwinds for managers to capitalise on right now.

The hedge fund CQS is starting to wade into beaten-down sectors of the credit market. In the firm’s 2020 outlook, Sir Michael Hintze, founder of the credit fund, writes that many investors were too ...

Lexology

Carlos Salas Najera, of the New York City Data Science Academy, has tested an old idea (pairs trading) for a strategy that could be tailored to energy stocks and related ETFs. The resulting paper is “Pairs Trading and VAR Analysis Applied to Energy Stocks.” His latest paper, though, has aRead More

Regional focused funds outperforming this year

Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Laxman Pai, Opalesque Asia: A survey of US asset managers and asset owners conducted by State Street Corporation predicts the continued prevalence of digital assets. Digital assets continue to come a long way in gaining credibility among institutions, with only six percent of survey respondents rep...

Laxman Pai, Opalesque Asia: A study uncovered what investors are actually paying versus managers' published fee schedules along with a reflection on 2018 fee trends across various asset classes and mandate sizes in active and passive management. The Institutional investment consulting firm Callan's...

Opalesque Industry Update - In a period of significant political unrest in Asia-Pacific - investors withdrew a total $19.2bn from hedge funds in Q1-Q3 2019, said Preqin said. Singapore-based Swiss-Asia Financial Services has generated the highest cumulative net return of 314.69% YTD (as of Septembe...

Omega Funds raises $438m in sixth fund to invest in the future of medicine Omega Funds, a leading international investment firm focused on delivering impactful medicines to patients, today announced the closing of Omega Fund VI, with $438 million in capital commitments. With Fund VI, the firm w...

CalPERS' committee mulls new investment policies From PIonline.com: CalPERS' investment committee is scheduled to decide at its Dec. 16 meeting whether to adopt new investment policies for its private equity and real assets programs that continue to redefine the roles of the staff and the investm...

RTW bets big on biotech From Institutional Investor: Biotech stocks have been among the hottest sectors this year. That's good news for hedge funds specializing in the sector, which have been among the top performers of 2019. The Nasdaq Biotech Index is up more than 20 percent this quarter alone ...

Pimco Investment executive Mihir Worah to retire in March From WSJ: Pacific Investment Management Co.'s Mihir Worah, one of the money manager's investment chiefs and a co-manager on its onetime flagship bond fund, will retire in March, according to an internal memo. Mr. Worah worked for Pimco fo...

AI research reveals crypto leaders are angry and depressed From Bitcoin: An artificial intelligence-driven personality research on the characteristics of crypto industry leaders such as Vitalik Buterin, Justin Sun, and Brian Armstrong found that intellect, liberalism, and cautiousness are their t...

From CNBC: A majority of financial executives in boardrooms around the world say Amazon Founder and Chief Executive Jeff Bezos should be considered as the top businessperson of the decade. Almost a third of chief financial officers (CFOs) quizzed in CNBC's latest Global CFO Council survey picked out...

Icahn lays off workers as firm decamps to Miami From PIonline.com: Activist investor Carl Icahn announced layoffs as he prepares to move his operation to Miami from New York in 2020. Icahn Enterprises will lay off 19 employees from its New York location and another seven employees from its White ...

Wirecard critics targeted in London spy operation From The Union Journal: A former Libyan intelligence chief, who told associates he's a shareholder in German obligations group Wirecard, financed a surveillance operation in London that targeted a series of investors such as hedge fund manager Cri...

India passes controversial citizenship bill that would exclude Muslims From NPR: Police in northeast India fired tear gas into protesters on Wednesday, as clashes escalated over a controversial citizenship bill passed by parliament. The legislation, which the Indian president is expected to sign ...

Private equity's end-of-the-party strategy From Institutional Investor: Flush with cash, private markets managers are trying to be cautious, even as they are confidently putting new money to work in the late stages of a ten-year-old bull market. Almost three-quarters of private equity firms and ...

From CNBC: DoubleLine Capital founder Jeffrey Gundlach believes that long-term Treasury yields are apt to jump over the next few months as the Federal Reserve works to fuel inflation higher. "I can't emphasize enough that October statement by Powell, where he said 'We're not even consideri...

Varma invests $556m in US equities via new co-developed ESG ETF From IPE: Finnish pensions insurer Varma has invested €500m ($556m) in a new US exchange-traded fund (ETF) it developed in conjunction with Legal General Investment Management (LGIM) and the index investment company Foxberry...

A hedge fund-backed art dealer just lost an $11m ruling to Sotheby's over an allegedly fake painting From Business Insider: Hedge fund founder David Kowitz is on the hook for roughly $6.6 million after a London judge ordered the investor to pay Sotheby's for an allegedly fake painting. The case ...

From Reuters: The first public report on climate-related risks to financial markets ever commissioned by a U.S. market regulator will be out in June, the head of the group charged with writing it said on Wednesday. The report, by a 35-member panel formed last month by the Commodity Futures Trading...

Activism is the No. 1 way to create superior returns, hedge fund manager Jamie Dinan says From CNBC: York Capital Management founder Jamie Dinan said the best way to create superior return is through activism. "In order to create alpha right now, activism is number one in my book, and I ...

CNBC

LIVEKINDLY

Former Libyan intelligence chief oversaw surveillance of investors including Crispin Odey

Business Insider

York Capital Management founder Jamie Dinan said the best way to create superior return is through activism. "In order to create alpha right now, activism is number one in my book, and I think that's ...

'"When you hear that, that the Fed is cheerleading inflation higher ... what that says is that the path of least resistance for the 10-year is higher," Gundlach said.

For the last five years, Brent Goettshe and four buddies had a pretty good thing going: They ran a bitcoin-mining shop, the unfortunately-named BitClub Network, sold shares of the proceeds to investors, raised almost three-quarters of a billion dollars and then made a bunch of shit up in order to ...

Business Insider

The Exchange Council of the European Energy Exchange (EEX) has confirmed the appointment of Dr Wolfgang von Rintelen to the Exchange Management Board of EEX.

SteelEye, a compliance technology and data analytics firm, has taken the next step in its international expansion plan with the opening of a new office in Paris.

Saudi Arabia really wanted its oil company, Saudi Aramco, to be worth $2 trillion. It did everything it could to get it there, including this: He unleashed a torrent of expletives in Arabic and English that shocked the roomful of battle-hardened bankers. The chairman was probably worried about ...

In this latest podcast, produced in association with SEI, Michiel Meeuwissen (pictured), Head of Hedge Fund Solutions at Kempen Capital Management, and SEI’s Ross Ellis,discuss the evolution of asset management, and in particular two key trends – vulnerable economics, and emboldened investors.

Cryptonews

Business Insider

International Business Times

I'LL TRADE YA It’s a done deal! Kinda ... Just before finding time to backthose articles of impeachment everyone seems to be talking about (more on that later), Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi gave the green light to a new version of a long-disputed trade deal between the US, Canada, and ...

Mondaq News Alerts

High growth algorithmic trading company, Vanguard Capital AG, has appointed Ritabrata Bhattacharyya (Rito) to its Senior Management team.

Guernsey Finance CEO, Dominic Wheatley (pictured), is to stand down from his role after five years. Wheatley will leave the promotional agency on the 30 June 2020, having been in the role since December 2014.

Crypto Asset Rating(CAR), the Independent Structured Rating Agency, has expanded its global team with the appointment ofJacob Prudhomme as Chief Legal Officer.

iM Global Partner, an investment and development platform focused on acquiring strategic investments in traditional and alternative investment firms in the US, Europe and Asia, has appointed Peter Stockall to lead sales in the US Offshore and Latin America region.