Bloomberg reports that Andrew Bazarian, a former manager at SAC Capital Advisors LP, plans to start his own Pan-Asian hedge fund betting on rising and falling stocks, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.
Bazarian left SAC’s Hong Kong office in early March, according to licensing data posted on the website of the city’s Securities and Futures Commission. He was one of four responsible officers in the firm’s Hong Kong office at the time of his departure, according to the data.
The Stamford, Connecticut-based hedge-fund firm headed by billionaire Steven A. Cohen reached a record USD1.8 billion settlement over a US government probe of insider trading. The company, which has become a family office and renamed itself Point72 Asset Management LP, agreed to manage money mainly for Cohen as part of the deal and has shrunk its headcount to 850 from 1,000.
Bazarian joined SAC’s main office in 2004 and moved to Hong Kong in 2008, according to the person, who asked not to be identified because the information is private. He managed a Pan-Asia long-short portfolio since 2004 and also oversaw Asian capital markets investments such as those in initial public offerings in his last two years at the firm, the person said.
Jonathan Gasthalter, a spokesman for SAC at Sard Verbinnen & Co., declined to comment on Bazarian’s plans, which were reported earlier by the Wall Street Journal.
SAC managed USD11.9 billion in assets as of Feb. 1, falling from USD15 billion at the start of 2013 as the firm returned money to investors, according to regulatory filings.
Carl Vine, a former Hong Kong-based SAC manager who relocated to the U.K. last year, is joining Dymon Asia Capital (Singapore) Pte. to start a global equity long-short hedge fund based in Oxford, the UK, Dymon President Jay Luo said in an interview in February. Vine left SAC after it shut its London office last year.
Pleiad Investment Advisors, a hedge fund spin-out from Soros Fund Management, has hired former Goldman Sachs prime brokerage executive Vien Chiu as its chief financial officer, as it prepares to launch in the third quarter of 2014, as reported by Reuters.
Johannes Kaps, chief executive officer of HS Group, which is providing seed capital to the hedge fund launch in Hong Kong this year, confirmed the appointment.
Pleiad, co-founded by former Soros investment executives Kenneth Lee and Michael Yoshino, is expected to launch a long/short equities hedge fund with a focus on China and Japan with at least USD150 million, making it one of the biggest hedge fund start-ups in Asia this year.
Chiu was an executive director at the prime brokerage unit of Goldman Sachs that provides services such as clearing trades and lending money hedge funds.
According to Singapore-based data provider Eurekahedge, Asia-based hedge funds' assets under management (AUM) reached a combined USD79.7bn as of March.
The March AUM represents the industry's rise of 41 per cent from April 2009. Hong Kong hedge funds had USD25.2bn of assets under management as of March, while Singapore's fund management firms had USD15.3bn. Singapore has 288 hedge funds compared with Hong Kong's 447 fund-management companies.
Northern Trust announced today that its hedge fund administration business will provide local market expertise and solutions to hedge fund clients as they participate in the Shanghai Qualified Domestic Limited Partner (QDLP) program. This specialist fund administration capability will be offered from Northern Trust’s Beijing office.
The Shanghai QDLP program allows foreign hedge fund managers to raise funds onshore and invest them abroad. This will contribute to the growing hedge fund industry in China, paving the way for an established alternatives industry in the country. Northern Trust Hedge Fund Services provides unique solutions to the alternatives industry through its ability to streamline the interactions between all parties involved and improve efficiencies between administrators, custodians, fund managers, asset owners and fundraisers. Capabilities include comprehensive middle office and administration services, specializing in trade processing, valuation, real-time reporting, cash management, accounting, collateral management and investor servicing.
“The Shanghai QDLP program marks the first time any foreign financial institution is permitted to raise capital from domestic investors in China and invest these proceeds offshore and will offer attractive opportunities to international hedge funds and domestic players alike,” said Michael Wu, country manager for Northern Trust in Beijing. “We are pleased to expand our award-winning hedge fund administration capabilities in support of this pilot program from our Beijing office.”
Northern Trust has a network of seven offices across Asia-Pacific. Its Beijing office received approval from the China Banking Regulatory Commission in August 2010, followed by an official opening later that year.
