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The Hennessee Hedge Fund Index declined 0.50% in May (+3.20% YTD), while the S&P 500 declined 1.35% (+6.97% YTD), the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1.88% (+8.56% YTD), and the NASDAQ Composite Index decreased 1.33% (+6.87% YTD).
Bonds advanced, as the Barclays Aggregate Bond Index increased +1.31% (+3.04% YTD) and the Barclays High Yield Credit Bond Index advanced +0.49% (+6.01% YTD).
“Most hedge funds lost money in May as risk assets experienced a sharp reversal due to concerns about the global economic recovery. Commodities took the biggest hit, with silver declining -21% and oil falling -10% during the month,”
Linedata (NYSE Euronext: LIN has released a new version of Linedata Beauchamp, its award-winning hedge fund portfolio management system. This new release – called Linedata Beauchamp Sigma – delivers a new and intuitive front-end for hedge funds to allow them to manage the increasing complexity of their business and to access and act on key data faster.
Mike de Verteuil (pictured), Linedata’s group business development director, says: “The hedge fund market continues to develop, and in this increasingly competitive space, firms are looking to stand out from their competitors. At the same time, hedge funds face pressure from regulators to
BNY Mellon has expanded its middle office outsourcing service for hedge funds, extending what was largely a Europe-only offering and rolling it out to select clients and prospects in North America and Asia.
Building on its Dublin-based operation over the past 12 months, BNY Mellon Alternative Investment Services has invested in new technology and workflow redesign to better support hedge fund clients and added capabilities resident at BNY Mellon, incorporating components of its OnCoreSM middle office solution for investment managers. BNY Mellon was one of the first global custodians to create an investment manager outsourcing business and continues to
Castle Hall Alternatives, a provider of operational due diligence to hedge fund investors, has recruited Ben Sansoucy, CA (pictured) as a senior manager.
Sansoucy was previously Senior Manager of Operational Due Diligence at the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), where he led the operational due diligence process overseeing external portfolio fund investments. CPPIB, based in Toronto, had assets of USD148.2 billion as at March 31, 2011.
Before joining CPPIB in 2007, Sansoucy held the position of Senior Manager with Fortis Prime Fund Solutions (Cayman), a fund administrator, where he was responsible for risk based inspections of key operating functions
The Hennessee Group’s Charles Gradante on the importance of considering both nominal and real returns…
Rarely do equity market pundits focus on real performance returns (nominal returns less core inflation). Reporting nominal returns, rather than real returns, is the standard of measurement for the media. However, it can be misleading to the average investor who may assume that a +12% nominal return is better than a +9% nominal return since they do not consider the "core inflation rate". A +12% nominal return with +7% core inflation is actually worse than a +9% nominal return with +2% core inflation. The real
Permal Group has appointed of Professor Zhiwu Chen (pictured), Professor of Finance at Yale University, as Chief Adviser. This is a consultancy role, working closely with Permal’s Investment Committee, which is made-up of four senior members and eight portfolio managers, and governs the Group’s investment strategy allocations.
Professor Chen maintains his role as Professor of Finance at Yale University, a position he has held since 1999.
Professor Chen is a highly respected financial academic, having written numerous books and treatises on China’s economy, emerging markets, securities valuations and capital markets (detailed list below). Before Yale, he was Associate
Gottex Fund Management Holdings’ co-founder, Max Gottschalk, has moved to Hong Kong to help further grow the company’s business in Asia Pacific.
Gottschalk, who is a Senior Managing Director, Head of Asia and Global Head of Marketing, as well as a board member of Gottex, co-founded the asset management arm of the Gottex Group in 1998, helping it to grow to one of the top 25 fund of hedge fund firms globally, and the seventh largest in terms of institutional pension assets.
Gottex has been investing in the Asian region since 2001 and has had an office in
Confluence, a provider of automated data management solutions for the investment management industry, has opened an office in San Francisco. The company’s fourth office worldwide will enable Confluence to pursue its strategic acquisition goals, while leveraging the area’s top technology talent and serving the growing reporting, transparency and control demands of the region’s hedge fund community.
"As a strong investment banking centre and a region known for technology innovation, San Francisco affords Confluence excellent opportunities for strategic growth through acquisition and continued product innovation," says Mark Evans, Confluence founder and Chairman and CEO. "We’re dedicated to working with our global
Henning Gebhardt (pictured), head of European equities at DWS Investments, looks at why investors are continuing to see Germany as the European growth engine…
The German economy continues to boom. Just a few weeks ago leading German economic research houses raised their forecasts for the German GDP growth to 2.8%. We forecast a growth of 3% year over year. In 2011, there is a high likelihood that Germany will again show the highest growth within the euro zone – as it did in 2010.
While strong exports contributed mostly to the growth in 2010, the recovery is now broadening further.
International derivatives exchange Eurex is to launch 19 single stock futures (SSF) on leading Polish companies on 27 June 2011. The new listings reflect customer demand for derivatives based on shares from one of the largest economies in Eastern Europe.
The new SSF contracts will be based on 19 shares of the Polish blue chip index WIG 20 (except CEZ) and denominated in euro. The launch extends Eurex’s SSF offering with a new country, bringing the total number of covered countries to 21.
“As Eastern European countries become more and more important for our customers and investors, demand for
