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As Wall Street experienced its best August since the 1980s, the hedge fund industry posted its fifth straight positive month returning 2.42 per cent in August, according to the Barclay Hedge Fund Index, compiled by BarclayHedge, a division of Backstop Solutions. By comparison, the S&P 500 Total Return Index was up 7.19 per cent in August.
For the year-to-date, the hedge fund industry added to its gains in August, returning 2.40 per cent for 2020. The S&P Total Return Index returned 9.74 per cent over the same period.
All but three hedge fund sectors tracked by the Barclay Hedge Fund Indices
BTON Financial has appointed fixed income and electronic trading expert, Andrew Bernard, as Non-Executive Director. Bernard joins BTON’s advisory board from Tradeweb, where he held a variety of senior positions over the past 17 years, including MD, Head of of Asia and as an MD in the London office. Prior to Tradeweb he served as Head of European Government Bond Sales and as Principal of the Global Leveraged Group for Bank of America, and Director of UK sales at Société Générale. Bernard will play a key role in shaping the direction of the company and delivering BTON Financial’s plans to bring
Paris-based systematic hedge fund Quantology Capital Management – which trades US equities using a quarterly earnings-based quant model – has generated positive returns from IT and internet positions, and now sees US markets firmly in “risk on” territory.
FXCM Group, an international provider of online foreign exchange trading, CFD trading, cryptocurrencies and related services, has added Volatility Index CFDs to its range of available trading instruments. In tracking the future volatility of the markets, rather than the stock prices themselves, the Volatility Index CFD now provide FXCM’s clients with the opportunity to profit directly from the unprecedented market swings seen today irrespective of which way the market is heading.
With the ticker symbol VOLX, aka “Volatility Index”, the product has the recently launched CBOE Mini VIX Future as the underlying asset. VOLX uses the price of options on
The Wilshire Liquid Alternative Index, which provides a representative baseline for how the broad liquid alternative investment category performs, returned 1.13 per cent in August, underperforming the 1.54 per cent monthly return of the HFRX Global Hedge Fund Index. The Wilshire Liquid Alternative Index family aims to deliver precise market measures for the performance of diversified liquid alternative investment strategies implemented through mutual fund structures, backed by a proprietary classification methodology.
“Markets continued to rally in August as optimism surrounding the rapid development of a COVID-19 vaccine helped drive markets to historic highs,” says Jason Schwarz, Chief Operating Officer of Wilshire
Activist-focused managers comfortably outperformed other strategy types last month, as the hedge fund industry continues to recover from the Covid-19 turmoil with solid August gains and positive year-to-date returns, new eVestment data shows.
Activism-focused hedge funds rose 7.88 per cent in August. Known – and sometimes feared – for their often-combative approaches to investing, which include a range of tactics and methods to effect board level change and improve shareholder value, such funds have now made 3.25 per cent on average this year, eVestment said.
That number is still down sharply from their 17.46 per cent gain last year, which
Aqua Digital Rising A new and alternative-asset and analytics investment platform has started its pre-funding round as it prepares for launch in January 2021.Aqua Indices represents one of the most significant developments in the area of alt-assets since the launch of cryptocurrencies. Big Data analytics linked to AI has allowed Aqua to construct indices based on humans. Hundreds of data points are collected and analysed using proprietary technology and then benchmarked against peer groups to allow a value to be created for individuals. Thousands of inputs, from performance to ‘likes’ are used to track and value the success of sports,
The Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst (CAIA) Association, the professional body for the global alternative investment industry, has Elizabeth Burton, CAIA, Chief Investment Officer, Hawaii Employees’ Retirement System, and William Ma, CFA, CAIA, Chief Investment Officer at Noah Holdings, have been elected to serve on CAIA’s Board of Directors.“Elizabeth and William are each outstanding additions to our board, and I join my colleagues in welcoming them and looking forward to all that they will contribute to our efforts,” says Valerie Sill, CFA, CAIA Chair of the CAIA Board of Directors and CEO of Dupont Capital Management. “Elizabeth’s perspective as an allocator
Dynamo Software, a provider of cloud software for the alternative investment industry, has acquired Imagineer Technology Group. The acquisition adds significant value across Dynamo’s product set and brings Dynamo’s customer base to over 1,000 clients of its CRM, deal management, portfolio monitoring, and investor reporting capabilities. Dynamo, majority-owned by San Francisco-based private equity firm Francisco Partners, did not disclose the terms of the deal.
Based in New York City, Imagineer has been a leading provider and significant software innovator in the alternative investment sector since 1998, providing CRM, investor relations, and reporting software for some of the highest profile hedge funds
A number of high-profile hedge funds are again ramping up bets against UK supermarket giant Sainsbury’s.
Third Point, along with AHL and GLG Partners, Man Group’s systematic and discretionary hedge fund units, have increased their short positions in the UK supermarket giant recently, according to regulatory disclosures made to the FCA since the start of September.
BlackRock Investment Management has also built a 2.65 per cent net short in the FTSE 100 company, while Citadel and Pelham Capital also maintain negative wagers against what is now regarded as the UK’s most shorted stock.
Sainsbury’s share price has fallen over the
