Warren Buffett places $1bn wind turbine order (BusinessGreen)
Warren Buffett‘s MidAmerican Energy Holdings has this week placed a $1bn wind turbine order with Siemens for five projects in Iowa, the biggest order the German supplier has received for onshore wind farms. Siemens announced yesterday it will provide 448 of its 2.3MW turbines with a total capacity of around 1,050MW, enough to power about 320,000 homes. Markus Tacke, chief executive of Siemens Energy’s wind power division, told news agency Bloomberg that wind turbines typically cost about $1m per megawatt of capacity, meaning the deal could be worth over $1bn.
Quant losses mount at Cantab (eFinancialNews)
The $3.4 billion managed futures strategy, which uses complex computer algorithms to capture trends in global markets, was already down 22.74% this year to November 29. The losses come at a difficult time for managed futures, which are facing their third consecutive year of negative performance. The Newedge CTA index is down 1.70% to December 13, after falling 2.87% last year and 4.45% in 2011. Unlike many of its peers, Cantab’s hedge fund posted gains in the past two years, with returns of 12.8% in 2011 and 15.3% in 2012. The fund targets 20% volatility – which can make it prone to greater swings in performance than other funds – and there are three main clusters of returns: medium-term momentum, value and short-term strategies.
GLG soft-closes market neutral hedge fund at $1bn (InvestmentWeek)
GLG has soft-closed its Market Neutral fund managed by Steve Roth after inflows took the strategy beyond $1bn (£610m) in size. The group has been preparing to soft-close the fund at $1bn for some time, and earlier this year said it expected to reach this benchmark before the year-end. The move is an effort to keep the fund more nimble by maintaining it at an optimal size. Back in 2011, the fund manager reportedly said the fund may even begin handing back capital to its existing investors in the future in order to keep it at a size which will not impact performance.
More Asia Hedge-Fund Managers Expect Higher Pay, Survey Says (Businessweek)
More Asia hedge-fund industry employees are expecting increases in bonuses this year as they delivered returns, a survey by executive recruitment firm Heidrick & Struggles International, Inc. (NASDAQ:HSII) showed. The share of respondents anticipating their bonuses to increase climbed to 48 percent in a survey carried out in September by the Chicago-based executive recruitment firm, up from 45 percent in last year’s poll. By contrast, those anticipating a decline in their bonuses shrank to 11 percent from about 25 percent last year. The survey’s findings highlight growing optimism among Asia’s hedge funds, which are heading for their strongest annual growth since 2009.
U.S. Treasury Research Office Sees Less Riskiness In Hedge Funds (Fa-Mag)
A preliminary analysis of a new trove of hedge fund data has found that the industry may not be as risky as conventionally thought, a U.S. Treasury Department official said on Monday. Richard Berner, director of the Treasury’s new Office of Financial Research, said the tentative conclusion is based on an examination of hedge funds’ leverage levels, risk modeling and the amount of hard-to-value assets, among other factors. The findings are important because the office’s research may influence policymakers’ debate on which financial institutions need to be more tightly regulated.
China’s Hedge Fund Industry Looks Set to Take a Great Leap Forward (InstitutionalInvestor)
In November 2012 hedge fund manager Fang Zheng began looking into China Metal Recycling (Holdings) after hearing rumors of questionable financial practices at the company, a Chinese scrap metal recycling outfit. Within weeks Zheng and his team of researchers at Keywise Capital Management (HK) concluded that there was substance to the talk. He began shorting the Hong Kong-listed stock between December 2012 and early January 2013 even as other investors were piling in, bidding up the share price by 26 percent, to a high of HK$10.30 ($1.33) on January 11.
Defensive plays on comeback stocks (CNBC)
Hedge fund gets its teeth into Darden (FT)
An activist hedge fund will on Tuesday launch a stinging attack on the management at Darden, owner of US restaurant chains Olive Garden and Red Lobster, as it steps up its campaign for the company to split. An investor group led by Barington Capital plans to publish a critique of five years of what it calls value destruction, citing a litany of complaints from failed acquisitions to poor menu choices. By going public with an 85-slide presentation setting out its case for change, the New York-based hedge fund is escalating pressure on Darden’s chief executive Clarence Otis, ahead of company earnings due this week.
Icahn: Herbalife is undervalued, has capital to spare; shares spike 10% (CNBC)
Billionaire investor Carl Icahn on Monday said he believes Herbalife Ltd. (NYSE:HLF) is undervalued and said he is satisfied with the company’s re-audited results. “We’re certainly happy about it,” billionaire investor Carl Icahn told CNBC on Herbalife’s completion of re-audited results. “I’ve never really doubted that this is a valuable company.” Earlier Monday, the nutritional-supplement maker said there were no material changes to the company’s audited 2010, 2011 or 2012 financial statements and with these amended filings, the company is now up to date with the SEC. Icahn said that the company is still undervalued and has capital. “It’s not a secret that [Herbalife’s] earnings have been increasing at about a 10-percent clip,” he said.
Soros-linked group sued for snooping on mining executives (DailyCaller)
Global Witness, an advocacy group heavily funded by left-wing billionaire George Soros, was sued Monday in London’s High Court by four people who claim the organization obtained and held their private information in violation of British law. The group, which bills itself as an outfit speaking truth to corporate power, says it “investigates and campaigns to prevent natural resource related conflict and corruption, and associated environmental and human rights abuses.” But it may have taken one investigation a bit too far. Benjamin Steinmetz, an Israeli billionaire who runs the mining company BSG Resources (BSGR), claims he and three other top executives somehow lost private data to Global Witness.
Jury hears final arguments in insider trading trial of SAC’s Steinberg (Reuters)
A lawyer for Michael Steinberg, an SAC Capital Advisors portfolio manager on trial for insider trading, urged jurors on Monday to find his client not guilty, saying the government’s star witness has been lying. But a federal prosecutor said Steinberg knew the information he received from SAC Capital analyst Jon Horvath was improper when he made trades that netted more than $1.4 million in profits. The two sides were making closing arguments in a trial that has been playing out in a federal court in New York for the past four weeks.
These Hedge Funds Are Losing in a Winning Year (InstitutionalInvestorsAlpha)
As 2013 winds down to its final two weeks of trading, it is shaping up to be one of the best years in recent memory for hedge funds. While the composite indexes are up between 8 percent and 9 percent, depending on the database you consult, a large number of funds are on track to finish the year with gains in the mid-teens to 20 percent range, with some up 30 percent or more. So, it must be especially frustrating and embarrassing for a small group of funds that look likely to finish the year in losing territory. That’s right: In a year when the major stock indexes are poised to rise somewhere in the 30 percent range, some funds are losing money.
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