Everyone knows what a jungle the financial markets are.
Everyone knows what a jungle the financial markets are. Not least Bill Hwang (pictured), whose New York-based Tiger Asia Management hedge fund has been savaged this year, falling 16 per cent reported FINAlternatives this week. The decline has arisen from shorting Chinese stocks sources told Bloomberg. Apparently, Hwang positioned 90 per cent of his shorts in China for Q1, betting against sectors ranging from media and internet to financial companies. They clearly haven’t paid off, although the blow has been softened somewhat thanks to the fund gaining 10 per cent in the first half of May. Tiger Asia’s assets have now fallen from USD2billion as of end-December 2010 to approximately USD1.3billion in April. This news illustrates the tough conditions being faced by short sellers who are seeing the price of what they believe to be overvalued companies continuing to rise. In an investor letter sent out in February, Hwang acknowledged as much, citing shorts as a “major drag on returns” when explaining the fund’s disappointing 0.5 per cent return in 2010.
