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The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission has filed a civil enforcement action charging defendant Feisal Sharif of Branford, Connecticut with operating a commodity pool Ponzi scheme that solicited approximately USD5.4m from at least 50 people to invest in a commodity pool named First Financial.
Sharif allegedly misappropriated at least USD900,000 of pool participants’ funds, using the funds to pay personal expenses and purchase gifts.
The CFTC complaint also charges Sharif with failing to register as a commodity pool operator (CPO) of First Financial.
According to the complaint filed on 26 November in the US District Court for the District of
AGacquisitions, a middle market investment bank and asset manager, is increasing its presence in the alternative investment business with the launch of a new hedge fund platform, Index Advantage – II (IA-II).
AGacquisitions Markets, a subsidiary of AGacquisitions India and TechTrend Analyser, a provider of technical products and solutions for alternate investing, have merged to jointly tap the growing market for alternative investments.
The two companies have been working together for a number of years with their first product, Index Advantage – I (IA-I) having delivered annualised returns of over 60 per cent. IA-I focused extensively on the S&P Nifty
Twin Capital Management, a New York-based event-driven hedge fund firm, has appointed Richard Fitzgerald as vice president and analyst.
Fitzgerald (pictured) will seek investment opportunities in special situations and deep value.
“We’re delighted to add an analyst of Richard’s calibre focused on special situations and deep value,” says David Simon, Twin Capital’s founder and chief executive officer. “The addition of Richard to our team gives added depth to the quality of our research capabilities.”
Before joining Twin Capital, Fitzgerald served as an analyst covering special situations with Jefferies’ Dakota Fund, an equity long/short fund focused on the financial services sector.
Northern Trust has expanded its alternatives business development team across the UK, Ireland, Luxembourg and Channel Islands with the appointment of Edwin Parker.
In this newly created role Parker (pictured) will focus on offering Northern Trust’s hedge fund administration services and its specialist private equity, infrastructure, and real estate fund administration services to fund managers across the region.
“Fund managers are faced with a number of pressures – from generating returns for their investors to meeting new regulatory requirements, and reporting on risk management and demonstrating transparency,” says Madeleine Senior, head of sales for asset servicing at Northern Trust in
The Financial Services Authority has granted approval for the acquisition of LME Holdings by Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing (HKEx).
The proposed takeover, which was first announced in June and approved by LME Holdings shareholders in July, will see HKEx Investment, a wholly-owned subsidiary of HKEx, acquire LME Holdings in a deal valued at over GBP1.38bn.
The FSA has now given notice in writing under section 301G(3) of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 of its approval “such that condition 1(a) contained in Part III of the scheme document relating to the Transaction dated 9 July 2012 (the "Scheme
London-based hedge fund manager, Stratton Street Capital LLP, aims to raise assets from Asian investors with its highly flying renminbi bond hedge fund. As reported by Bloomberg, the USD215million Renminbi Bond Fund has returned an impressive 23 per cent this year.
It invests in dollar-denominated investment-grade bonds and uses non-deliverable currency forward to hedge investments to the Chinese currency.
Since its inception in November 2007 the fund has returned 86 per cent according to managing partner Andrew Main. Main said that the firm was beginning to raise its profile in Asia and added: “We’re seeing a lot of interest at
As the Financial Services Authority’s consultation on changes to the way investment firms handle cash on behalf of clients closes, business advisory firm Deloitte has identified 16 changes that are likely to increase costs for banks and brokers, and directly or indirectly raise trading costs for clients.
Mike Williams, partner in Deloitte’s banking and capital markets prudential regulation practice, says: “The amount of money affected by the new proposals is potentially vast – about GBP100bn. If the FSA decides to alter or potentially remove the UK-specific ‘alternative approach’ which is used by some of the larger banks and investment firms
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s division of clearing and risk (DCR) has issued a time-limited, no-action letter granting relief from required clearing for certain swaps entered into by qualifying cooperatives.
The no-action letter provides that DCR will not recommend an enforcement action for failure to clear a swap entered into by a cooperative if the cooperative and the swap meet certain conditions set forth in the no-action letter.
To qualify for the no-action relief, one of the counterparties to the swap must be a cooperative whose members are either non-financial entities or cooperatives whose members are non-financial entities.
In addition,
The Conifer Group, a provider of fund administration, middle office, trading and prime brokerage services to the hedge fund industry, has promoted Howard Eisen to head of business development.
Eisen (pictured) joined Conifer as a managing director in January 2012 to add his hedge fund experience to Conifer’s business development team.
Eisen will be reporting to Conifer president and chief executive Jack McDonald.
In addition, Conifer also named Manish Garg as the firm’s chief information officer. Garg has been serving as acting head of technology. Garg will be reporting to Conifer chief operating officer Sal Campo.
"Over the past 10 months,
The European Energy Exchange (EEX) has completed a contract agreement with the Hungarian Ministry of National Development for the auctioning of EU Allowances (EUA) for the second trading period of the EU ETS.
The auction volume amounts to 2.5 million EUAs and is to be auctioned on the EEX Spot Market in two tranches of 1.25 million EUAs each.
The auctions will take place on 10 December and 17 December 2012 with the bidding window open from 1pm to 3 pm CET.
The Hungarian Ministry of National Development – which has recently been admitted as auctioneer for Phase III auctions
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