All Alternatives articles – Page 180
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Features
Outperformance there for the taking
The data below, supplied by Financial Risk Management, the hedge fund specialist, tracks the performance of every type of hedge fund conceivable. The figures on the opposite page are FRM estimates of how the industry has grown in the past seven years and more specifically, which of the four classes ...
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Features
Making introductions
Until recently placing money with a hedge fund manager was predominantly done through small independent companies offering what is known as capital raising or contract marketing. In practice hedge funds lacking the resources to fund their own sales teams employ someone independent. Typically that someone might be Arpad Busson running ...
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Features
Time to re-examine hedge strategies
We fielded a barrage of calls from the press in the immediate aftermath of September 11’s attacks. Typically, they only needed a quotation or two on what the implications were for hedge funds. However, with about 40 mid-month fund returns to go on, our reply was that hedge fund strategies ...
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Features
Getting to grips with fund of funds managers
Hedge funds seek to make money in markets irrespective of market direction – a laudable aim, particularly in the current uncertain times. Hedge fund managers have the ability to leverage up if they are overwhelmed by opportunities, or go into cash if market conditions are not promising for their particular ...
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Features
Dipping a toe in the water
As hedge funds continue to win a measure of acceptance from pension funds and other institutional investors, they seem set to change the dynamics of the relationship between consultants and their pension fund clients. Across the board, consultants are finding that their larger, more active clients are expressing curiosity about ...
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Features
The hunt for 'decorrelation'
In a climate of low interest rates and low growth, pension funds are finding it increasingly difficult to earn a reasonable return without an unacceptable increase in risk. A bull market in equities is now a distant memory, and returns from equities and bonds continue to converge. This is creating ...
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Features
Construction of a customised and diversified portfolio
Hedge funds still present a number of difficult analytical problems for those who wish to integrate them into a traditional approach. To achieve success, it is important to ensure that the objective of the hedge fund allocation is clearly defined at the outset and that expectations regarding return potential and ...
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Features
Clamour for information
Over the past year hedge funds have boomed. An estimated $8.4bn (€ƒ9.2bn) flooded into the sector in the second quarter of this year, and new alternative investment firms seem to appear on a weekly basis. But as capital flows towards hedge funds, there is a growing demand for greater transparency ...
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Features
Taking a 'pure' approach to long-short equity
CDC IXIS Asset Management has recently enlarged its investment capabilities through the creation of a ‘Long-Short’ Equity Fund. This hedge fund will, in turn, reinforce company expertise in alternative investment products, targeting an institutional clientele of qualified investors. The acquisition of the American holding company Nvest at the end of ...
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Features
An 'untraditional' multi-manager approach to alternatives
Transparency? Defined risk management? Short lock-up periods? Fee-sensitive? A fund that can handle critical mass? Do these sound impossible? Think again. These are hedge fund characteristics that investors have been seeking with little or no success in recent years – and with the new problems that lie ahead since the ...
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Features
Transparency/liquidity needs of alternative investment
In the past, alternative investment strategies (AIS), such as hedge funds and managed futures investing has been dominated by high net worth investors. They were willing to bear the disadvantages of the mostly illiquid and non-transparent but steadily returning investment strategies. Due to the attractive risk-reward characteristics of AIS as ...
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News
AXA IM creates new alternative assets division
UK/FRANCE - AXA Investment Managers (AXA IM) has created a new structured and alternative investment management (SAIM) division within the firm to house its structured and hedge fund businesses....
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News
BBSP moves into UK fund management market
FRANCE/UK – Paris based market forecasting specialist company, BBSP, has announced its intention to move into the UK’s fund management market....
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News
SEK17bn Telia scheme tests hedge fund strategy
SWEDEN - The approximately SEK17bn Farsta-based Telia pensionsstiftelse (pension fund) for Swedish telecommunications company Telia, has made a foray into hedge fund investing to test the waters for future allocations to the asset class....
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News
Duke Street starts Spanish venture firm
SPAIN – London based pan-European fund management group, Duke Street Capital Group (DSCG) has launched Iberduke Capital Partners (IPC), a private equity fund management company based in Madrid....
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News
Pension funds should go for gold, says WGC
UK – Managers of pension funds and other institutional funds in the UK should not ignore gold when looking at alternative asset classes, according to Dr Robert Weinberg, head of institutional investment at the World Gold Council….
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News
German savings banks to create new pensions arm
GERMANY - The German public savings’ bank network, the Deutsche Sparkassen- und Giroverbandes (DSGV), is to enter into a joint venture with its insurance equivalents in order to compete with its private rivals in the new pensions market in Germany, Dietrich H. Hoppenstedt, the network’s president, has said in an ...
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News
Dobson joins Schroders as new chief executive
UK – Schroders has appointed Michael Dobson as chief executive and set out proposals to acquire Dobson’s own asset management firm, Beaumont, for £33.5m (€53.4m) as part of the deal...
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News
MFS appoints new head of UK sales
MFS International U.K. has appointed Jonathan Willcocks as its director of sales....
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News
US DB plans 'fine-tuning' portfolios, says Mercer
US - Defined benefit plan sponsors are fine-tuning their investment portfolios rather than making any dramatic changes, according to a survey by consultant William. M. Mercer....