The Winners of The Hedgeweek Awards 2012 for excellence among hedge fund managers and service providers, as voted for by our readers…

By Simon Gray – The global hedge fund industry has just suffered its second losing year in four, yet the mood across the industry today is optimistic, albeit cautiously so. Last year’s overall sub-par performance across the sector, albeit with a few significant exceptions, appears to have been accepted with relative equanimity by an investor base conscious that they were not missing out on spectacular returns from other investment classes.

Agecroft Partners specialises in consulting and third-party marketing for the alternative investment industry, with a particular focus on hedge funds. The firm raises assets globally for institutional-quality managers by utilising a consultative approach within the institutional investor community. Its approach is to develop in-depth product knowledge of the funds the firm represents and to be able to articulate their investment processes as well as the hedge fund managers.

Year after year, award after award, Anchin, Block & Anchin is recognised as a top-tier firm throughout the US in terms of its size, management, scope of services and work environment.

Barclays Capital Fund Solutions (BCFS) is the asset management business of Barclays Capital, specialising in multi-asset investing. Its expert managed quant and fully discretionary fund management teams aim to deliver steady investment returns across all market cycles over the long term, through a focus on downside risk management, flexibility and liquidity.

Last year was a good one for London-based Dalton Strategic Partnership. While most managers struggled to raise capital, the firm was able to hard-close both the Melchior European Fund (MEF), an offshore Cayman fund, and the Melchior Selected Trust: European Absolute Return fund, a Ucits-compliant vehicle, which are managed using the same investment strategy.

Last year saw Deutsche Börse achieve its best sales performance since the record year of 2008. Sales revenue increased 6 per cent to EUR2.23bn, while net interest income climbed an impressive 26 per cent to EUR75m.

Deutsche Bank’s Global Markets division is vast. It employs 6,000 professionals in 40 trading rooms across the globe, 18 of which are located in cities in the Asia-Pacific region. Few prime brokers in the region can claim to have such a solid on-the-ground trading presence, giving hedge fund clients the speed of information and execution that’s critical for operational efficiency.

Since Arpad Busson founded EIM in 1992, the firm, which specialises in the construction and management of tailor-made fund of hedge funds portfolios, has seen its assets under management grow to USD6.2bn.

Two more fund managers joined IMQubator last year, taking the total number of seeded funds in its stable to nine. As a leading seeding platform, the business objective of the Amsterdam-based firm is simple: putting investors in control when investing in hedge funds and delivering to them a multiple income stream by investing in emerging managers. Each manager receives a seed ticket of EUR25m, with IMQubator taking a 25 per cent equity stake in the management company.

So massive is the wall of regulation rushing toward the investment industry as a whole that regulators themselves are struggling to keep up. In February the European Securities and Markets Authority published its latest contribution to fleshing out the European Union’s Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive, a discussion paper on key concepts of the directive designed to help it draw up technical standards.

The London-headquartered IMS Group is a leading provider of consulting and integrated business support to the asset management and securities industry. The group’s core service offering is regulatory compliance consulting to UK-regulated financial services firms.

JP Morgan’s Hedge Fund Services (HFS) group resides within Worldwide Securities Services (WSS), providing comprehensive solutions to both hedge funds and funds of hedge funds looking to optimise operational efficiency, mitigate risk and enhance revenue.

Liongate Capital Management, founded in 2003, manages USD2.5bn in assets on behalf of its global client base, which includes leading global pension funds, wealth managers, insurance companies and sovereign wealth funds.

Last year Lyxor’s Managed Account Platform continued to go from strength to strength. A total of 28 new funds were onboarded to the industry’s largest individual commingled managed account platform across a diverse range of strategies including special situations, merger arbitrage, emerging market long/short equity, global macro and long/short credit.

Mohican Financial Management, based in Cooperstown, New York and Wilton, Connecticut, was established in October 2002 by brothers Eric and Dan Hage, who between them have more than 35 years’ experience trading convertible securities.

London-based Peregrine Communications is one of Europe’s most successful specialist financial public relations agencies. Established in 2003 by partner and chief executive Anthony Payne (pictured), Peregrine has built an award-winning reputation based on proven results and first-class client service.

The PIMCO Multi-Asset Volatility Fund treats volatility as an asset class and targets net annualised returns of 10 to 15 per cent with equivalent volatility, independent of broad measures of market return. Positions span interest rates, equities, commodities and currencies, and reflect structural, opportunistic and tail-risk hedging dimensions.

Netherlands-based Saemor Capital was established in 2008 with the backing of insurance company Aegon, where a number of Saemor’s team previously worked. Founder and chief executive Sven Bouman was head of equities at Aegon, while chief financial and operating officer Patrick van de Laar was head of derivatives and hedging.

Founded by Thomas Walek in 1998, Walek & Associates is a multi-million-dollar public relations consultancy with offices in New York, Boulder and Hong Kong, and clients in every key market arena.