MACRO HEDGE FUND MANAGERS KNOW THE MARKETS can be a cruel mistress. Just ask Louis Bacon. This past summer Bacon, a top macro investor and founder of New York-based hedge fund firm Moore Capital Management, announced that he was returning $2 billion-25 percent of Moore’s capital – to clients. He also said he was moving money out of macro, a strategy that seeks to exploit big-picture economic trends and global capital market events, because he wasn’t “comfortable” taking much risk in the current environment. Nowadays, central banks and policymakers drive the markets and fundamentals play a diminished role. Bacon has called his 2012 results disappointing. As of mid-November his flagship, $4 billion Moore Global Investment Fund, had returned just 3.72 percent on the year…
Fiscal Cliff Follow-Up at the Biggest and First Hedge Fund Networking of 2013 in New York City (Melodika)
Hedge Fund, Alternative Investments, Private Equity, High-Frequency, Algorithmic and Proprietary Trading Managers, Investors, Executives and Professionals From the Most Prestigious Firms Getting Together for Networking and Cocktails at Golden Networking’s Hedge Funds Happy Hour, January 8 New York, NY, United States, January 03, 2013 — The first day of the year, the U.S. House of Representatives approved a bill undoing tax increases for more than 99% of households, providing a temporary victory to President Obama and Democrats as Republicans vowed to fight them in the upcoming months for spending cuts in exchange for raising the debt ceiling. What will be the impact of the fiscal cliff debate resolution on the hedge fund industry and the economy in general?
SAC, Founder Face Investor Suit Over Insider Trading Scandal (Law360)
A putative class of Elan Corp. shareholders has sued Steven A. Cohen and his hedge fund SAC Capital Advisors LP over an alleged $276 million insider trading scheme involving shares of the drug giant’s stock, marking the first private suit to emerge from the tipping scandal. Six Elan investors allege in the Dec. 21 complaint that Cohen failed to properly supervise Mathew Martoma, a former SAC portfolio manager accused in November of netting the hedge fund $276 million in profits and avoided losses by trading on…
Hedge fund manager Cooperman optimistic toward stocks (Reuters)
Leon Cooperman, the chief executive officer of hedge fund Omega Advisors, said on Wednesday he is optimistic toward stock markets this year, while bonds are poised for a sell-off. Cooperman, whose hedge fund had $7 billion in assets as of November, told CNBC television that “equities are in a zone of fair valuation to modest undervaluation,” while bonds are in a “bubble.” He cited the slight improvement in the global economy, improving U.S. home prices and the pickup in China’s economy, while low-yielding government bonds are a “joke” and high-yield corporate bonds are no longer a bargain given their lower yields.
The Big Fiscal Cliff Deal Winners: Hedge Fund And Private Equity Moguls (Forbes)
In 2010 Steve Schwarzman, who runs the private equity and hedge fund behemoth the The Blackstone Group L.P. (NYSE:BX), compared efforts to raise taxes on private equity and hedge fund managers with Hitler’s invasion of Poland. Schwarzman ended up apologizing for the inappropriate analogy, but on the morning after the House of Representatives voted for a Senate-passed deal to avert the fiscal cliff, it increasingly looks like hedge fund and private equity managers have won their war in Washington. The bottom line is that hedge fund and private equity moguls will continue to be taxed relatively lightly after the new fiscal cliff legislation. Carried interest will continue to be taxed as long-term capital gains for hedge fund and private equity managers…
Hedge Funds End ’12 Up 5.5% (Finalternatives)
Hedge funds lagged the broader markets for the fourth straight year in 2012, with estimated returns of about one-third the performance of the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index. The average hedge fund rose 5.5% last year, according to Hedge Fund Research. That’s a good deal better than the average 5% loss suffered in 2011, but it was well behind the S&P500’s 16% return. Hedge funds have not beaten the broad-market index since 2008, when the S&P was down nearly 40%, while the average hedge fund was down less than 20%. It is the longest period of under performance for the hedge fund industry since 1998.
