Toscafund’s Savvas Savouri Confident of UK Recovery Despite Deep Recession (Hedge Week)
Savvas Savouri, chief economist and partner at long-running UK hedge fund manager Toscafund Asset Management, believes the UK is well-positioned to emerge from the current coronavirus downturn, despite GDP falling more than 20 per cent in the second quarter, sending the country into its sharpest recession on record. New data released on Wednesday shows the UK has now slipped into recession for the first time since 2009, in the midst of the Global Financial Crisis, after the economy contracted by 20.4 per cent between April and June this year. But despite the stark numbers, Savouri believes the UK labour market will recover sooner than is widely being suggested.
Steve Cohen’s Point72 and Other Hedge Funds are Sending Urgent Requests to Find a Replacement After Robinhood Data on Hot Stock Trades Suddenly Went Dark (Business Insider)
Point72 is among hedge funds scrambling to find alternative data sources after day-trading app Robinhood decided to stop providing data on which stocks are most popular on its platform, according to people with direct knowledge of its outreach. Representatives for Point72’s market intelligence data team, including Zach Cohen and Kerry Van Name, have been reaching out to other trading platforms and investing apps in search of data partnerships over the past day, according to people with direct knowledge of their efforts.
Russell Aboud moves in with VGI Partners (AFR.com)
Not two months since Doug Tynan resigned as an executive director of Rob Luciano’s hedge fund VGI Partners (citing personal reasons), the firm has an intriguing new tenant in its Phillip Street, Sydney headquarters: investment banking and funds veteran Russell Aboud. Aboud was most recently chairman of Manikay Partners, the hedge fund of his former UBS colleague Shane Finemore, which shuttered in March after 12 mixed years.
Image By Monkey Business – Adobe Stock
Hedge Funds Warn That Shorting Dollars Is Now a Crowded Trade (Bloomberg)
Betting against the dollar is looking increasingly like a crowded trade that’s due for a squeeze, some hedge funds say. BlueBay Asset Management, which oversees more than $60 billion, has taken profit on short dollar positions, while AMP Capital Ltd. pared its bullish bets on emerging-market currencies. K2 Asset Management Ltd. is taking risks off the table partly on concern over a sudden bounce in the world’s reserve currency.
Former Hedge-Fund Titan Michael Novogratz Breaks Down 4 Reasons Why Bitcoin is Heading to $20,000 by Year-End (Business Insider)
“I’m really bullish.” That’s what Michael Novogratz, a former hedge fund manager and CEO of Galaxy Digital, said on “The Tim Ferriss Show” podcast (recorded May 18, 2020) when asked about Bitcoin. “I was the first institutional-grade investor that started talking about it, for better or worse, back when it was trading around a hundred,” he said. “I made some witty comments about Bitcoin and the next day I was on the cover of the Financial Times.”
Warren Buffett Buys Back Stock, But We Aren’t Out of the Woods Yet (The Motley Fool)
There hasn’t been all that much activity from arguably the world’s greatest investor. And that’s during a time when stock prices trade well below fair value. However, if there’s little trading from Warren Buffett, many believe there has to be a reason. The Oracle of Omaha has mainly been selling during this time and buying only a little. What this says is that Warren Buffett believes we aren’t out of the woods yet. Even more telling is that the investor simply doesn’t believe there’s a company out there worth his attention. And with the potential – nay, certainty – of future market crashes down the line, maybe we should all be looking at what Buffett is up to.
Emerging-Markets Duo Rounding Up LPs (HFAlert.com)
Two traders who worked together at Bienville Capital and Passport Capital have lined up $500 million of commitments for a new firm. As co-chief investment officers of New York-based Isometry Capital, Suhaib Jamjoom and Sebastian von Renouard plan to deploy the capital via three strategies. All are expected to have launched by yearend, making the operation among the largest to get off the ground in 2020. Each of the strategies would key in on equity investments in emerging markets. The first, entailing long/short plays in the Middle East and North Africa, was scheduled to go live this month in the form of a $200 million separate account run for an undisclosed sovereign wealth fund. One of the other programs would follow a discretionary global-macro strategy. The third would take a quantitative approach. Both would draw capital from the sovereign wealth fund and other investors via separate accounts and commingled funds.
Tesla Says Short Seller Is Funding Ex-Employee’s Lawsuit (Bloomberg)
Tesla Inc. says hedge fund Cable Car Capital LLC, which is shorting the company’s stock, is funding a former employee’s allegations that the company smeared him by accusing him of sabotage and stealing sensitive information. The carmaker said in a filing Monday that Martin Tripp’s 2018 counterclaim against Tesla was being funded by Cable Car, even though Tripp has said under oath that he had no financing or connection to Tesla short sellers.
$34 Billion Citadel Poaches a Rising Star from Billionaire Lee Ainslie’s Maverick Capital to Join its Ashler Stock-Picking Unit (Business Insider)
A rising star at Maverick Capital has been poached by billionaire Ken Griffin. Ben Bologna, the head of the consumer sector for billionaire Lee Ainslie‘s Maverick, is joining $34 billion Citadel‘s Ashler Capital, one of the three stock-picking units at Griffin’s Citadel, Griffin’s firm confirmed to Business Insider.
Sales Conversation Analytics Company Gong Raises $200 million at a $2.2 Billion Valuation (CalcalisTech.com)
The mega-round, led by New York-based hedge fund Coatue Management, comes less than a year after Gong’s $65 million round in December. Israel-based conversation analytics startup Gong.io Ltd. has raised $200 million in a series D round made at a $2.2 billion valuation, the company announced Wednesday. “We would rather see the world doing better even if that means we make a little less money, but it is clear that the current situation gives Gong some tailwind,” co-founder and CEO Amit Bendov said in a phone interview with Calcalist.
Wednesday 8/12 Insider Buying Report: UPWK, VIRT (Nasdaq.com)
At Upwork, a filing with the SEC revealed that on Tuesday, Director Gregory C. Gretsch purchased 547,844 shares of UPWK, at a cost of $14.71 each, for a total investment of $8.06M. Upwork is trading up about 3.5% on the day Wednesday. Before this latest buy, Gretsch bought UPWK on 2 other occasions during the past year, for a total cost of $6.61M at an average of $9.54 per share. And also on Tuesday, Chief Executive Officer Douglas A. Cifu bought $2.25M worth of Virtu Financial, buying 100,000 shares at a cost of $22.45 a piece. Virtu Financial is trading up about 2.6% on the day Wednesday. So far Cifu is in the green, up about 5.2% on their purchase based on today’s trading high of $23.63.
The CFO of Iridium Communications (NASDAQ: IRDM) is Selling Shares (Analyst Ratings)
Yesterday, the CFO of Iridium Communications (IRDM), Thomas Fitzpatrick, sold shares of IRDM for $1.01M. Following Thomas Fitzpatrick’s last IRDM Sell transaction on June 05, 2013, the stock climbed by 21.8%. In addition to Thomas Fitzpatrick, 5 other IRDM executives reported Sell trades in the last month.
Sure Bezos Sold Some Amazon Stock, but That Doesn’t Mean You Should (Investorplace.com)
When Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) CEO Jeff Bezos does just about anything, it’s a major news item. After all, he’s one of the richest people on the planet. And when Bezos buys or sells AMZN stock shares, people pay attention. It’s also a matter of public record when a corporate insider such as Bezos buys or sells large amounts of his own company’s stock. It’s a smart idea for insiders to keep tabs on this activity. Sometimes it’s a genuine cause for concern when an insider unloads a large quantity of his or her company’s stock shares.
