Latest News
Managed futures gained 1.90 per cent in September, according to the Barclay CTA Index compiled by BarclayHedge.
The index is now up 2.45 per cent after three quarters in 2010.
“The best September for equities since WWII, a robust rally in commodities, and a deteriorating US dollar all joined forces to create a profitable trading environment for CTAs,” says Sol Waksman, founder and president of BarclayHedge.
All of Barclay’s eight CTA indices had gains in September. The Barclay Diversified Traders Index gained 3.20 per cent, agricultural traders were up 2.94 per cent, systematic traders rose 2.29 per cent, and discretionary
Citi has cleared its first client trades through the Chicago Mercantile Exchange on the CME’s newly launched interest rate swap clearing platform.
In addition to CME, Citi currently clears interest rate swap trades for clients through LCH.Clearnet’s Swapclear service.
Andrew Morton, global head of G10 interest rate trading at Citi, says: “Citi is pleased to have cleared some of the first interest rate swaps for its clients through the CME platform. As a global institution, we support international regulatory initiatives mandating central clearing and believe the central clearing of derivatives will be a core business focus of our franchise going
Minneapolis-based Groveland Capital has begun to actively market its Groveland Hedged Credit Fund to institutional investors.
Nick Swenson founded Groveland along with members of his credit team and the fund was launched in January this year.
Swenson was previously the portfolio manager and partner of Whitebox Hedged High Yield Fund from 2002 to early 2009, where peak AUM was USD1.65bn.
Swenson says: “The market environment typically offers reasonable returns via arbitrage techniques, yet generating outsized returns by leveraging the bell curve is not our game. We seek out those unusual and irregular situations that contribute extra alpha via the insight
The Lyxor Global Hedge Fund index, an investable index based on Lyxor’s hedge fund platform which tracks the overall hedge fund universe, was up two per cent in September lifting year to date gains to 2.8 per cent.
Financial markets featured strong trends during the month of September. US equities rallied hard, as did the USD prices of commodities (including precious metals) and foreign currencies such as the euro. Credit market returns were positive but less extreme, with high yield posting larger gains than investment grade. Treasuries were virtually flat on the month.
The event driven space provided generally positive
The European Fund and Asset Management Association says it is very concerned about the European Commission’s financial services tax proposals.
It considers that the policy reasons advanced by the Commission are seriously flawed in the case of the funds industry.
For example, there is no acknowledgement of the fact that the funds industry has not benefited from government support and would not expect to rely on state bailout as a safety net.
Moreover, taxing measures could have a significant impact in the context of individual investors’ retirement provisions.
Peter de Proft, director general of Efama, says: “Increased costs due to
Royal Bank of Canada and BlueBay Asset Management have reached an agreement on terms for a recommended acquisition of BlueBay by RBC.
Under the terms of the acquisition, BlueBay shareholders will be entitled to receive 485 pence in cash for each BlueBay share. This represents a premium of 29 per cent to the last closing price of BlueBay shares as at 15 October 2010.
The acquisition values the issued share capital of BlueBay at approximately GBP963m (CAD1.56bn).
It is expected that the acquisition will be implemented by way of a court-approved arrangement and that formal documentation will be sent to
Omgeo and EuroCCP’s new pan-European equities matching and central counterparty clearing service for hedge fund transactions has executed a live trade with prime broker and executing broker Credit Suisse and hedge fund manager Citadel.
Credit Suisse and Citadel intend to continue to partner with Omgeo and EuroCCP to ensure that their interfaces become scalable and ready to be extended to a broader range of counterparties in the future.
The service allows executing brokers and prime brokers to clear hedge fund transactions and will streamline the processing flow and mitigate the counterparty risks associated with these types of institutional cash equities
Timberland Investment Resources, a forestry investment firm, has launched its London-based European investment business, Timberland Investment Resources Europe.
Co-founded by managing partners Hugh Humfrey (pictured) and GianPaolo Potsios, TIR-Europe plans to provide UK and European institutional and high-net-worth investors with access to large-scale forestry investment opportunities worldwide.
The firm is awaiting authorisation from the UK’s Financial Services Authority to start marketing its services to investors.
Humfrey is responsible for overseeing TIR-Europe’s investment strategy while Potsios is responsible for directing business development and investor relations. Together they have over 50 years of investment management and corporate and investment banking experience.
Matrix Group, the privately owned UK financial services business, has appointed Simon Elvidge as group head of compliance and assurance.
Elvidge, who has over 20 years’ experience in senior compliance and control function roles, joins from Numis Securities where he was head of compliance and managed the compliance teams in both the UK and US.
Before this, Elvidge worked within Société Générale group and for Newedge Group, the joint venture between Société Générale and Calyon. Over a period of 8 years he held a series of senior roles with varied oversight responsibilities covering global, European and UK aspects of the
Amundi has launched Amundi Funds Multimanagers Long/Short Equity, a new sub-fund of its Luxembourg-domiciled umbrella fund Amundi Funds.
This sub-fund invests in Ucits III funds employing long/short and/or equity arbitrage strategies, as well as volatility management.
The fund aims to outperform Eonia by five per cent per annum while maintaining a maximum level of annual ex-post volatility of eight per cent.
Amundi says the current environment of low interest rates, economic uncertainty and high volatility is particularly favourable for absolute return strategies, which aim to capitalise on the divergence in performance between securities, sectors or geographic regions rather than
