Toronto money management firm Sceptre Investment Counsel and Fairfield Greenwich Group, a USD16.6bn hedge fund and fund of hedge funds manager based in New York, have launched a co-operative venture to provide alternative investment solutions to Canadian institutional and high net worth investors. Sceptre will advise investors on alternative investments and distribute Fairfield Greenwich funds of hedge funds.

'Sceptre has many strong relationships in the Canadian investment community, and our clients have long trusted us to manage their pooled funds, mutual funds, and other investments,' says president and chief executive Richard L. Knowles.

'FGG manages some of the industry's finest funds of hedge funds and other alternative asset products. We believe that Sceptre's clients will understand the great value that FGG brings to the table, and that they will have considerable interest in the outstanding hedged products to which they may gain access through this relationship.'

Fairfield Greenwich partner and chief global strategist David B. Horn says: 'For more than 25 years, FGG's expertise in manager selection, due diligence, and risk management has benefited our investors. We have great confidence that Sceptre's extensive network of investors will appreciate the quality and diversity of FGG's platform of products, and the institutional investment and risk management with which we support it.

'Sceptre's clients have come to expect the highest levels of advisory, management, risk, and client services from this award-winning firm. Through this new endeavour, the FGG team stands ready to offer equally distinguished hedged strategies and services to serve the alternative investment needs of Sceptre's clients.'

Established in 1955, Sceptre Investment Counsel is one of Canada's oldest independent investment managers and financial advisors, managing client assets of USD9.5bn. Originally founded as an institutional fund manager, Sceptre now offers retail and private client portfolio management. The manages segregated and pooled fund portfolios for pension and other savings plans of corporations, government-sponsored funds, universities, unions, charitable foundations, endowments and reserve funds of insurance companies.

Founded in 1983, Fairfield Greenwich Group is an alternative investment specialist that manages its own hedge funds and selects external managers for a limited number of joint venture relationships to develop transparent single manager and multistrategy hedge funds, as well as managing funds of hedge funds, real estate and private equity vehicles and marketing third-party managers' products.

Fairfield Greenwich currently has some USD16.6bn in client and firm assets under management and more than 120 employees, 20 of which are shareholders, at offices in New York, London and Bermuda as well as representative offices elsewhere in the US and Europe, one in Beijing and a joint venture in Singapore.