Activist Investor Cevian Capital Bumps Up Its Stake in Aviva: Swedish Hedge Fund’s Holding is Now Worth £802m (This is Money)
Activist investor Cevian Capital has bumped up its stake in Aviva. The Swedish hedge fund, whose boss Christer Gardell has been dubbed ‘the Butcher’, revealed in June that it had taken a 4.95 per cent stake in the British insurer. It has now ramped that up to 5.02 per cent, stock market filings revealed, taking its holding to just over £802million. Gardell has a reputation for ruthlessness and called for the return £5billion of excess cash to shareholders by next year. This month, Aviva’s chief executive Amanda Blanc set out plans to hand back £4billion.
Stuart Davies Joins Magnetar to Spearhead Business Development for Systematic Investing (Business Insider)
EVANSTON, Ill., Aug. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — Magnetar Capital (“Magnetar”), a leading alternative asset manager, today announced the hire of Stuart Davies as head of Business Development, Systematic Investing. A 24-year industry veteran, Davies brings a wealth of alternative investment, client partnership and product innovation experience to Magnetar’s Systematic Investing team.
Honor Roll H1 2021: Hedge Funds in Asia-Pacific (Preqin)
Asia-Pacific-focused hedge funds continued to build on 2020’s positive momentum into the first half of 2021. With the exception of March, Preqin’s All-Strategies Hedge Fund Benchmark was positive in every month of H1. Check out our league tables for a detailed look at the top performing hedge funds in Asia-Pacific by strategy and size, as well as the region’s largest and most active allocators.
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Climbing the Risk-Return Curve (Hedge Nordic)
Stockholm (HedgeNordic) – As part of its allocation process, multi-asset, multi-strategy hedge fund HCP Black has always been invested in real estate, primarily either through listed real estate investment companies or exchange-traded funds (ETFs). Tommi Kemppainen, the CEO of Finnish asset manager Helsinki Capital Partners and portfolio manager of HCP Black, now plans to climb the risk-return curve by investing in a value-add real estate fund.
How Hedge Funds’ Short Books Have Fared This Year (Institutional Investor)
Several long-short funds are deep in the red due to their shorts, while others are in the black despite losses. Shorting in a surging stock market is not exactly a road to riches.Just ask any long-short hedge fund, especially the ones that were caught up early in the year when retail investors jubilantly bid up the stock prices of stocks widely-known to be shorted.
Out of Bill Ackman’s SPAC Woes Comes Innovation (The Economist)
In the classic 1980s arcade game, Pac-Man is pursued by killer ghosts as he attempts to achieve his goal of gobbling up little dots. These colourful ghosts have various tactics to scupper Pac-Man: “Blinky” (the red one) gives chase; “Pinky” and “Inky” (the pink and the blue spooks) obstruct his path and attempt to corner him. Bill Ackman, a hedge-fund tycoon turned sponsor of a “special-purpose acquisition company” (spac), has become a financial Pac-Man of sorts.
Blurring the Boundaries Between Hedge Funds and Private Equity within Investor Portfolios (Hedge Week)
Allocators are blurring the boundaries between the hedge fund and private equity sides of their portfolios, as once strictly segmented alternatives buckets begin to blend, according to investment firm Cambridge Associates. Dan Aylott, Managing Director and Head of European Private Investments, at Cambridge Associates says that the distinction between hedge funds and private equity has become an increasingly “grey area”.
Investors Might Be Losing Patience With Cathie Wood’s ARK Funds (Barron’s)
Cathie Wood’s ARK Invest has attracted billions of new cash since last year, but lately, those fortunes have started to reverse. The firm’s six actively managed exchange-traded funds took in a whopping $20 billion in 2020 and another $16 billion in the first six months of 2021, thanks to the spectacular performance of the growth-oriented innovation stocks they invest in.
Crypto Investor Su Zhu Says He’s Bullish on Dogecoin – and Values Its Appeal to Everyday Investors (Business Insider)
Crypto investor Su Zhu is bullish on dogecoin because its affordability, accessibility, and name recognition appeals to everyday investors, he said on an episode of his Uncommon Core podcast released on Wednesday. The boss of Three Arrows Capital, a crypto hedge fund, said that dogecoin’s strengths are that anyone can own whole units, it can easily be transferred between people, and its meme nature makes it accessible to anyone.
Thursday 8/26 Insider Buying Report: BHG, ATGE (Nasdaq.com)
At Bright Health Group, a filing with the SEC revealed that on Wednesday, Adair Newhall purchased 48,694 shares of BHG, at a cost of $10.34 each, for a total investment of $503,324. Bright Health Group Inc is trading up about 1.3% on the day Thursday. And on Tuesday, Director Michael W. Malafronte purchased $323,910 worth of Adtalem Global Education, purchasing 9,000 shares at a cost of $35.99 each. Before this latest buy, Malafronte purchased ATGE at 2 other times during the past twelve months, for a total investment of $480,590 at an average of $36.41 per share. Adtalem Global Education is trading up about 2.2% on the day Thursday. So far Malafronte is in the green, up about 5.9% on their purchase based on today’s trading high of $38.10.
The President of Lazard (NYSE: LAZ) is Selling Shares (Analyst Ratings)
Yesterday, the President of Lazard (LAZ), Alexander Stern, sold shares of LAZ for $4.1M. Following Alexander Stern’s last LAZ Sell transaction on August 20, 2020, the stock climbed by 17.5%. Based on Lazard’s latest earnings report for the quarter ending June 30, the company posted quarterly revenue of $843 million and quarterly net profit of $123 million. In comparison, last year the company earned revenue of $592 million and had a net profit of $73.46 million. The company has a one-year high of $48.98 and a one-year low of $30.66. Currently, Lazard has an average volume of 358.40K.
Wolff, Stroll Cleared After Insider Trading Probe (Sports Mole)
Financial authorities have cleared Toto Wolff and Lawrence Stroll amid reports they were under investigation for a recent transaction involving Mercedes and Aston Martin. After Wolff bought into Aston Martin last year with a personal 1 percent stake that is now worth $36 million, Mercedes followed suit by upping its stake to 20 percent. Then, Mercedes-AMG chief Tobias Moers was appointed Aston Martin’s new CEO, with the developments prompting the opening of a financial probe into the affair by BaFin – Germany’s federal financial authority.
SEC Pursues “Shadow Trading” Insider Trading Case (The National Law Review)
The SEC recently charged a former employee of a biopharmaceutical company with insider trading in advance of an acquisition but with a unique twist: Trading the securities of a company unrelated to the merger. The employee, Matthew Panuwat, did not trade his own company’s or the acquiring company’s securities, but instead purchased stock options for shares of a competitor not involved in the acquisition, in the belief (as alleged by the SEC) that the competitor’s stock price would also benefit from the news.
