Managed futures traders got off to a fast start in 2015, with a 3.41% gain in January according to the Barclay CTA Index compiled by BarclayHedge.
“Trends from the prior month stayed on track in January as commodity prices continued to move lower while bonds, equity markets outside the US, and the US dollar all moved higher,” says Sol Waksman, founder and president of BarclayHedge.
All of Barclay’s eight CTA indices had strong gains in January. The Currency Traders Index jumped 4.11%, Diversified Traders were up 4.09%, Systematic Traders gained 3.68%, and the Financial/Metals Traders Index was up 2.27%.
January’s one-month gain of 4.11% by Currency Traders outpaced their 3.31% return for all 12 months of 2014. The Barclay CTA Index gain of 3.41% in January is over half of its total 7.62% return in 2014.
The Barclay BTOP50 Index, which measures performance of the largest CTAs, was up 4.00% in January.
“The Systematic Trader subset of the BTOP50 Index returned 4.64 percent in January, and 11 of the 13 managers were profitable,” says Waksman.
