The Hedgeweek USA Awards 2013 presented earlier this month in New York City brought together the leading names in the US hedge funds industry to celebrate the achievements of the best performing managers and service providers in 2012.
Delivering the opening remarks at the Awards, Jim Munsell, Partner, Sidley Austin, LLP, highlighted a number of significant business and regulatory developments for alternative investment funds and their managers. He concluded, “Most of the recent developments have served to increase barriers to entry, increase costs, and compress operating margins. Nevertheless, this remains a great business to be in, with tremendous opportunities for wealth creation for those with sufficient capital and a willingness to embrace the new realities of the post-crisis alternative asset management world.”
With the much-anticipated liberalisation of hedge fund marketing regulations, managers at the event agreed the challenge for hedge funds in the USA this year is to maintain performance in the face of significant competition from other investment sectors.
To ensure that nominees for the fund manager awards were selected not just for their performance and size, but also for sound qualitative reasons, Hedgeweek commissioned Marianne Scordel of Bougeville Consulting to research the top three performers in each of the hedge fund strategies during 2012. The list of nominees was then sent to Hedgeweek’s readers, who were asked to nominate the top manager in each strategy (see list of winners below).
The winners were determined by the votes of Hedgeweek’s 41,000 readers, who include institutional investors, wealth managers, fund managers and other industry professionals at firms including fund administrators, prime brokers, custodians, law firms and advisers.
Bougeville Consulting’s overview and analysis, along with the complete list of top three managers in each strategy follows.
Hedgeweek 2013 USA Awards Winners List
Best Macro Manager – Swiss Seagull AG
Best Event Driven Activist Manager – Jana Partners LLC
Best Event Driven Merger Arbitrage Manager – Paulson Investment Company Inc
Best Event Driven Distressed Manager – HG Vora Capital Management
Best Event Driven Multi-Strategy Manager – Numen Capital LLP
Best Relative Value Convertible Bond Arbitrage Manager – HFR Asset Management LLC
Best Relative Value Volatility Arbitrage Manager – LJM Partners Ltd
Best Relative Value Multi-Strategy Funds Manager – Barnegat Fund Management Inc
Best Equity Short Bias Manager – Silvercreek Management Inc
Best Equity Market Neutral Manager – Bayou City Capital LP
Best North American Index Provider – Hedge Fund Research Inc
Best North American Hedge Fund Administrator – Admiral Administration (US) LLC
Highly Commended North American Fund Administrator – Opus Fund Services
Best Offshore Hedge Fund Administrator – Meridian Fund Services (USA) LLC
Best Prime Broker – Concept Capital Markets LLC
Best North American Hedge Fund Research Provider – BTIG LLC
Best Managed Accounts Platform – Lyxor Asset Management Inc
Best Seeding Platform – Tiger Management
Best Risk Management Software Provider – CurAlea Associates LLC
Best Fund Accounting and Reporting Systems Firm – SunGard VPM LLP
Best Managed Account Platform Technology Firm – Eze Castle Integration
Best North American Trading Venue – Liquidnet Inc
Best North American Accounting Firm – Anchin Block & Anchin LLP
Best North American Regulatory Advisory firm – Turnkey Trading Partners
Best North American Public Relations Firm – Walek & Associates
Best North American Law Firm – Sidley Austin LLP
Best Offshore Law Firm – Mourant Ozannes
Best North American Third Party Marketing Firm – Agecroft Partners LLC
