Elm Ridge Continues to Hemorrhage Capital (HFAlert.com)
Elm Ridge Management is clinging to life, with Duke University now its only major investor. Continuing a long decline from its $2.2 billion peak, the value-focused equity shop saw the net assets of its two hedge funds drop to about $40 million last year – with founder Ron Gutfleish and a few friends and family members accounting for most of the vehicles’ remaining capital. Beyond that, the Irvington, N.Y., firm’s sole mandate is a separate account it runs for a Duke entity known as Dumac. That portfolio contained $101 million of gross assets at yearend 2018, down from $143 million a year earlier. Its size today is unknown. One source said Gutfleish has been digging into his own pockets to subsidize Elm Ridge’s fund business.
AlphaOne’s Dan Niles Says He’s ‘Glad He Got Out’ of Apple Despite Earnings Beat (CNBC)
Hedge fund manager Dan Miles told CNBC on Tuesday that Apple’s stock is overvalued, as the company’s better-than-expected earnings results were powered mostly by iPhone sales. Niles, the founding partner of AlphaOne Capital Partners, said on CNBC’s “Closing Bell” said the company’s results in its services and other products segments didn’t support the stock price. “I’m glad I got out, when I saw the numbers … all the beat is from iPhones,” Niles said.
Warren Buffett Is Giving Up on Newspapers (The Wall Street Journal)
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. is selling its newspapers to publisher Lee Enterprises Inc. for $140 million, a rare admission by the billionaire investor that he views his newspaper business as unsustainable. Mr. Buffett, a lifelong newspaper lover, has said for years that Berkshire’s newspaper business declined faster than he expected. In mid-2018, Berkshire hired Lee to manage all of its newspapers except the Buffalo News.
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Novogratz: It’s January 1999. Stocks Set For ‘Parabolic’ Move Higher (Forbes)
Former hedge fund manager Michael Novogratz, currently the CEO of a cryptocurrency investment firm, says stocks are poised to rally dramatically this year. “It looks like we’re set up for these parabolic moves,” Novogratz said in a speech at the Context Miami conference today. A “phenomenal mix of fiscal and monetary policy” makes it difficult to create any kind of selling pressure for equities. Central banks around the world are easing. “There’s this sugar high going on that’s not going away,” Novogratz said. Markets have shrugged off exogenous events like Iran and the coronavirus. “It’s shocking how well the market trades” with these events, which are not yet completely resolved. “There is money that wants to be put to work.”
World’s Best Performing Large Hedge Fund, TCI Fund Management, Is Demanding Better Sustainability Metrics (CleanTechnica.com)
If you’re an optimist, you can find signs that the climate emergency is being taken more seriously everyday across sectors and across countries. The good news to share now is that TCI Fund Management, a hedge fund that manages $30 billion in assets under Sir Christopher Hohn, is now considered a “climate radical.” This is big news because, as Bloomberg Green notes, Hohn is famous for his tough approach in business, which could be good for the green economy. His tough-as-nails approach “made Hohn’s TCI Fund Management the world’s best-performing, large hedge fund last year.”
New Geneva Equity Hedge Fund Prepares for Coming Bear Markets (Opalesque.com)
B. G., Opalesque Geneva for New Managers: Stouff Capital’s Urizen fund, launched in September 2018, follows a quantamental strategy, that is, one that combines both a fundamental approach with a quantitative one. The fund is run by Julien Stouff, who has 25 years of experience in trading and asset management, together with a technology officer and a risk officer. The quantamental strategy makes perfect sense nowadays, he says. Much more than pure quant. And it will be perfect for the times to come. The problem with quant: Quoting Stanley Druckenmiller (Duquesne Capital) who once said quant funds, who manage $1tln of assets, had muted his signals, and Philippe Jabre, who closed his Jabre Capital hedge fund in 2018 and said that new technologies were making the market more difficult to anticipate, Stouff continues: “our fund is a quantitative fund and we understand perfectly the world of quantitative funds.
The Breakthrough Year (Hedge Nordic)
Stockholm (HedgeNordic) – After six of its holdings were taken over during last year, Japan-focused long/short equity fund Sector Zen has received another takeover bid for one of its holdings. The latest takeover attempt represents the 40th takeover in Sector Zen’s long portfolio since the fund was launched in the first half of 2006. After the market close in Tokyo on January 23, U.S. private equity firm Bain Capital announced a tender offer for all shares in Showa Aircraft, a Japanese maker of transportation equipment. Bain Capital planned to launch a tender offer to buy all the shares at 2,129 yen per share, and the shareholders who tender their shares would receive an additional special dividend of 631 yen.
