100 Hedge Funds To Watch (Trading)
100 Hedge Funds To Watch (Trading)
100 Hedge Funds To Watch (Trading)
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US FUNDS
Angelo Gordon John Angelo and Michael Gordon New York, London Distressed, $11bn convertible arb, and merger arb Founded in 1998 by John Angelo, former head of arbitrage at LF Rothschild and Michael Gordon, former head of research at LF Rothschild, Angelo Gordon focuses on identifying arbitrage opportunities through a rigorous research based approach. Recently became another of the growing band of hedge funds and private equity rms seeking to take advantage of turmoil in the US subprime mortgage market by investing in mortgage servicing company Ocwen Financial. 25% Founder David Tepper is one of the top 50 richest men in America with a fortune estimated around $2bn. Recently attracted interest for its large ownership position in Delphi, the bankrupt car parts supplier, and its clashes on whether management has the shareholders best interests in mind or those of GM and the UAW. Takes a systematic, computer-assisted approach to investment involving both value and momentum factors applied to various asset classes. View themselves as fundamental rather than quantitative as they like to understand the story behind their models rather than reply solely on data. Currently considering an IPO. European: 44%; Global: 36% Atticus is a reluctant activist, but when it moves - as with Deutsche Brse, where it worked in parallel with TCI, or more recently Dodge Phelps - it is effective. The rm has connections everywhere thanks to the presence of Nat Rothschild, scion of the banking dynasty, as co-chairman, helping it rapidly become one of the biggest in the business. Rarely for a hedge fund the growth also seems to have helped, rather than hindered, returns, although it remains a highly volatile fund thanks to a relatively concentrated portfolio which often includes big stakes in companies. Although it is event-driven, it focuses on a handful of themes, such as metals, exchanges and railways, where it has strong views, then looks for corporate triggers. A new fund focused on speciality nance, one of its big themes, has just been launched.
Distressed
$4bn
$35bn
Atticus Capital
$14bn
Avenue Capital
Distressed
$13.3bn
Brother and sister team, Lasry and Gardner have built their careers on the belief that bad news is good news. Avenue event driven: -7.5%, Last year, Morgan Stanley paid $300m for a stake of between 15 and 20 per cent in the rm as part of Morgan Stanley chief executive John Macks drive to build up the banks presence in the hedge fund business. Avenue Europe:15.9% One of the few openly gay hedge fund managers, Mr Bessent actively supports such organisations as Empire State Pride Agenda, New Yorks gay political lobbying organisation. Mr Bessent was one of the longest-running members of one of the most successful hedge fund groups of all time, Soros Asset Management. As a student at Yale he planned to be a journalist but then took an internship with celebrated commodities money manager Jim Rogers. 8.86% Blackstone has about $2bn in hedge funds, primarily in distressed, directional equity and also in relative value trading. It also has a signicant fund of funds business through BAAM, but is best known for its huge private equity operation. The valuation of Blackstone in its forthcoming IPO could provide a blueprint for the private equity and hedge fund business, and is likely to make it the largest listed alternative fund manager. The former right hand man of Julian Robertson at Tiger also nds time to be an adjunct professor of nance at the Columbia Business School, where he teaches a Seminar in Advanced Investment Research. 2.86% in Jan (full yr 2006 not available) 98% BlueMountain has rapidly become a major trader in the growing credit derivative markets since starting up in late 2003.
New York
Long short eq- $1bn uity, currencies and commodities Hedged: $2bn Distressed, directional eq- Total: $78.7bn uity and relative value Long short equity Relative value credit $3.8bn $3.2bn
New York J Tomlinson Hill, Bruce Amlicke, Halbert Lindquist John Grifn Andrew Feldstein, Stephen Siderow and Gery Sampere T Boone Pickens New York New York and London
BP Capital Management
Dallas, Texas
Mr Pickens ranks in the top 400 richest people in the world, according to Forbes magazine. He is acknowledged as one of the true pioneers of energy trading, as well as one of the oldest managers still running money - he will be 80 next year. He has featured on the front of Time Magazine and considered a run for president in 1988. Donated $7m to Hurricane Katrina relief effort. One of the longest serving hedge fund managers, Dalio has built Bridgewater into a multi-faceted rm with a total of $150bn in assets under management. Considered a pioneer of currency overlay strategies.
Bridgewater
Ray Dalio
Westport, Conn. Currency overlay, credit and emerging market debt Activist
Bulldog Investors
Mr Goldstein scored a big win against the Securities and Exchange Commission last year when he won a lawsuit challenging the right of the regulator to require hedge fund advisers to register with it. The rules were thrown out as a result. He is being sued by ofcials in Massachusetts who claim he improperly marketed his funds to unqualied investors by providing information on his web site - which now reads currently being updated. Cantillon World: Mr von Muefing gave one of the clearest indications yet of the power of the star hedge fund manager when 5.6% he left Lazard Asset Management in 2003, taking much of its $4bn in hedge fund assets and a large number of the rest of the rms alternative investment team with him after a spat over pay. Earlier this year it voluntarily closed its $1bn technology and $350m healthcare funds, saying it could not nd enough investment opportunities - a move investors applauded. Recently launched an event driven fund with less than $750m serving as further evidence of convergence between private equity and hedge funds. The group has over $56bn under management in its private equity group, and is considering whether to go public, following the footsteps of Fortress and Blackstone.
Cantillon
Long-short equity
$8.1bn
Multi-strategy
Name
Manager
Main Location(s)
Strategy
New York
Mr Kovners made his rst trade by borrowing $3,000 on a credit card to buy soybean futures. The contract rose to $50,000, but he then watched the contract drop to $22,000 before selling. He later said that this rst trade taught him the importance of risk management. Notoriously secretive, Mr Kovners 5th Avenue Mansion in New York City features a lead-lined room to protect against a chemical, biological, or dirty bomb attack. He is chairman of neoconservative think-tank the American Enterprise Institute Mr Arnold, a former natural gas trader at Enron, started Centaurus with about $8m of his own cash after the energy group collapsed. Last year his legend grew as his fortunes and trading positions in natural gas were in direct contrast with those of Brian Hunter, the infamous Amaranth Advisors trader, also 32 years old at the time, who last year presided over the loss of $6bn and the eventual closure of his fund. Cerberus runs both hedge fund and private equity, where it specialises in distressed companies. It owns or part-owns the nance arm of General Motors, banks in Japan and Austria, and Formica, maker of the eponymous kitchen surface. Best-known as the employer of Dan Quayle, former US vice president, Cerberus recruited former US Treasury secretary John Snow as chairman last year. Citadel is one of the most active trading rms in the world, and is rapidly diversifying into areas traditionally dominated by investment banks including marketmaking and servicing hedge funds. On any given day it can account for over 3 per cent of all trading volume on NYSE Euronext. Last year it became the rst hedge fund to access the public debt markets and is widely thought to be considering an initial public offering of its stocks. Grifn founded Citadel in his Harvard dorm room and is married to Anne Dias Grifn, who runs her own hedge fund, Aragon Global Management, one of the largest run by a woman. Tribeca is Citigroups attempt to catch up with Goldman Sachs in the hedge fund business by building its own fund internally. But the bank reversed strategy this month when it bought the $4.5bn fund Old Lane for an estimated $600m, mainly to secure Vikram Pandit, its head, to run its alternative investment business. This prompted Dean Barr to step down as head of the hedge fund unit, and has led to questions both about Citis strategy and whether Old Lane will see an outow of investors, particularly after its disappointing performance last year. Tribeca uses a multi-strategy style similar to Old Lanes. Tribeca lags behind its peers so far this year with a 1 percent gain through March, compared with an industry average of 2.9 per cent. Pandit left Morgan Stanley in March 2005 during a power struggle after running its biggest and most-protable division, institutional securities, for ve years. Prior to starting Clarium, in 2002, Thiel sold PayPal to eBay for $1.5bn. In 2005, Clarium was honored as the global macro fund of the year by both MarHedge and Absolute Return, two hedge fund trade magazines. While at Stanford, he founded The Stanford Review, now the universitys main conservative/libertarian newspaper. Recently co-produced the feature lm Thank You for Smoking. Clarium runs a contrarian approach based on top-down themes, currently including energy and petro-dollars as the source of the global wave of liquidity. Recently installed in a 29,700 sq ft ofce on the 57th oor of the John Hancock building, Chicago. Convexitys was one of the largest capital raisings, if not the largest ever by a hedge fund, opening with about $6bn and surpassing former Goldman Sachs star Eric Mindichs $3.5bn at his Eton Park hedge fund. Convexity is said already to possess many of the characteristics of more mature asset management institutions.
Centaurus Energy
John Arnold
317%
Cerberus Capital
Steve Feinberg
New York
Distressed
21%
Citadel
Ken Grifn
Chicago
Multi-strategy
$12bn
Citigroup/ Tribeca
New York Oliver Dobbs, Albert Ee, Gay Huey Evans, Steve Geovanis, Rick Harrell, Soa Katzap
Global macro
$1.9bn
Convexity
Jack Meyer
Chicago
DE Shaw
David Shaw
New York
Multi-strategy
$26.3bn
17.3%(composite fund)
DE Shaw consistently ranks in the top ve hedge fund groups by assets. It was once termed by Fortune magazine as the most intriguing and mysterious force at work on Wall Street. The company is extremely selective in its hiring, with only 1 in 500 candidates making the grade. It employs cutting edge, complex mathematics for its quantitative investment processes. Dr Shaw served as an advisor on President Clintons council of Advisors on Science and Technology, and Larry Summers, Clintons secretary of the Treasury, works at DE Shaw part time. More recently the rm has branched out in qualitative strategies, while its private equity investments include FAO Schwartz, the famous US toy shop, and eToys, formed from the remains of retailer KB Toys. John Costas carved Dillon Read out of UBSs principal nance and commercial real estate businesses as an in-house hedge fund, bringing 175 traders under him. The move was widely seen as an attempt to stem defections of investment bankers to hedge funds.
John Costas
New York
Fixed income
$3.5bn
Elliott Associates
Paul Singer
New York
15.90%
Elliott Associates is one of the oldest hedge funds under continuous management. Known for its erce activism, it has gained a high prole in Germany, where it fought alongside small shareholders to prevent stafng company Adecco delisting the remaining minority of DIS. It recently built up a sizeable stake in retailer Pier 1 Imports and is pressing the company to cut costs and bring in more independent board members. Founder Edward Lampert is already being called his generations Warren Buffett. He started ESL when he was just 25 after earning an economics degree from Yale. Average returns since have been almost 30 per cent. ESL is now the largest shareholder of Sears, owner of Kmart, where he also serves as the chairman. In 2003 he was kidnapped at gunpoint from a car park at ESLs Greenwich, Connecticut ofces. Four captors held him for ransom, keeping him bound and blindfolded for some 30 hours before he negotiated his own release. The kidnappers were caught after Lamperts credit card was used to order pizza. The mastermind of the plot was sentenced to 15 years in prison earlier this year. When Eton Park started up in 2004 it was the biggest launch ever, raising $3.5bn from investors thanks to the reputation Mr Mindich built as head of risk-arbitrage at Goldman Sachs, where he had become the banks youngest partner aged 27. Eton Park is becoming an increasingly important actor in global markets recently raising $550m for emerging markets private equity investments Farallon, one of the largest hedge fund groups in the world, has been active in the subprime mortgage area, buying up distressed assets and lending to one cash-strapped mortgage company. Its private equity operations are growing, and it is often mentioned as a possible initial public offering candidate. Fortress in February became the rst big US-based hedge fund and private equity manager to list its shares. The big jump in Fortress stock is expected to lead to several other hedge fund IPOs. Morgan Stanley purchased FrontPoint in November for an undisclosed sum (sources said around $300m) as part of the banks efforts to build its alternative investments business. FrontPoint was founded by former Morgan Stanley executives. Mr Einhorn has become something of a reluctant activist in recent years, winning a board seat at troubled mortgage lender New Century Financial and ling a whistleblower lawsuit against Allied Capital. Mr Einhorn resigned from the New Century board prior to the lenders ling for bankruptcy protection. GSAM is the second largest hedge fund manager in the world after JP Morgan. Despite a rough 2006, the groups agship Global Alpha fund has historically generated very strong returns including a 40 per cent gain in 2005.
ESL Investments
Edward Lampert
New York
40% plus
Eton Park
Eric Mindich
New York
Multi-strategy
$6.2bn
13% (2005)
Farallon
Thomas Steyer
San Francisco
$26.2bn
20%
Fortress FrontPoint
$30bn $5.5bn
17% 7.95%
Greenlight Capital
David Einhorn
$4.7bn
13%
Goldman Sachs Eric Schwartz New York Asset Manage- and Peter Kraus ment
$32.5bn
Name
Manager
Main Location(s)
Strategy
Highelds Capital
Boston
activist
Mr Grubman famoulsy grilled then-Enron chief Jeff Skilling on a conference call, leading Mr Skilling to call him an unprintable name. More recently, Highelds has been a vocal opponent of the terms of the proposed buyout of Clear Channel. Mr Icahn is one of the worlds most famous investors, having started out as a corporate raider fuelled by Michael Milkens junk bonds in the 1980s. He is now one of the most vocal activist hedge fund managers, currently agitating for change at Motorola, among other places. He failed in his bid to break up Time Warner but still won concessions and turned a tidy prot on his investment in the media giant. According to Absolute Return magazine, JP Morgan became the worlds largest hedge fund manager in 2006 largely on the strength of its acquisition of Highbridge Capital. JP Morgans purchase kicked off a wave of big investment banks taking stakes or buying hedge fund managers outright. Mr Meriwethers Long Term Capital Management nearly collapsed in 1998 and needed a $3.6bn bailout amid the Russian debt default. But he was back in business a year later and earned positive marks in February when his fund gained even as global markets plunged. Mr Kingdon, a former pension fund administrator at AT&T, has been among the most successful hedge fund managers on Wall Street since launching his rm in 1983 with $2m. Mr Chanos, widely regarded as the dean of short-sellers, is best known for his early bet that Enron Corp. was overvalued and ripe for a fall. He also made a bundle last year betting that internet gaming shares would decline. They plunged when the US Senate passed tough new laws cracking down on Web gambling.
Icahn Partners
New York
activist
$5.5bn
24.80%
Glenn Dubin
New York
multi-strategy
$34bn
21.17%
John Meriwether
multi-strategy
$2.6bn
7.50%
multi-strategy short-biased
$5.9bn $3.5bn
Lone Pine
Stephen Mandel Greenwich, Conn. Alec Litowitz Lee Ainslie Evanston, Ill. Dallas, Texas
$11bn
Mr Mandel is a Tiger cub who trained under legendary manager Julian Robertson at Tiger Management. Mr Mandels early enthusiasm for Google led many other investors to pile into the Internet search engine stock. Like other star managers, Mr Mandel takes little new money. Mr Litowitz left Citadel in 2005 to found Magnetar. In a recent letter to BusinessWeek, he said his fund anticipated volatility in the subprime mortgage market, which he called very favorable to his strategy. Another Tiger cub, Mr Ainslie prides himself on heavy fundamental research. After notching several years of 20 per cent plus performance, Maverick went at in 2005, leading Mr Ainslie to apologise to investors, who nevertheless withdrew 15% of the assets last year. Millennium got caught up in the mutual fund market timing scandal, paying $180m to settle with regulators, but Mr Englander remains one of the most senior and respected members of the hedge fund community.
$4.1bn $9.3bn
$8.6bn $12.5bn
Moore Global Along with his friend and fellow hedge fund superstar Paul Tudor Jones, Mr Bacon is one of the survivors of Investment: 8% old-style global macro investing. With a pedigree dating back to the mid-1980s Mr Bacons investment style is more risk-averse than many of the other higher-performing global macro funds. Mr Bacon tends to keep his head down and defends his privacy carefully. 15.86% Och-Ziff has branched out into private equity and direct lending to companies and launched successful funds focused on Europe and Asia. The hedge fund group also helped Malcom Glazer with his takeover of Manchester United, lending him a chunk of the money for the bid. Mr Cooperman is among the more outspoken US hedge fund managers. In 2005, he repeatedly berated MCI for accepting a takeover bid from Verizon that he said was too low. Mr Anderson, who ran commodities trading for Tiger Management, took some losses last year on a bearish bet on copper. But he has delivered excellent returns over the years. Lehman bought a 20 per cent stake in Ospraie in 2005. Mr Paulson bet correctly on the collapse in the subprime mortgage market in the US, making returns of more than 60% in February alone in one fund. The value of a fund he set up last year to bet on the decline has doubled to $1bn, but the company remains more focused on its traditional merger arb business. It became one of the largest investors in the London Stock Exchange this year as it helped the company ght off a bid from Nasdaq. Pequot received some unwanted attention last year when a former Securities and Exchange Commission regulator said his attempt to investigate alleged insider trading at the hedge fund - involving John Mack, who was briey Pequot chairman before leaving to head Morgan Stanley - was blocked over political considerations. The SEC dismissed those allegations and exonerated Pequot. The rm has its own $1.8bn technology venture capital operation.
Och-Ziff
Dan Och
New York
Multi-strategy
$21bn
Omega Advisors Leon Cooperman Ospraie Management Paulson & Co. Dwight Anderson John Paulson
New York
$7.1bn
Pequot Capital
$7.3bn
10%
Perry Capital
Richard Perry
New York
Multi-strategy
$13bn
Perry Intl: 10% Perry Capital is one of a handful of big hedge fund groups that is thought to be considering an initial public offering. Mr Perry has been involved in some high-prole deals, and has backed the movie studios of Hollywood moguls Bob and Harvey Weinstein. 9.50% With a frigate as its logo, an ofce full of swashbuckling paraphenalia and a self-imposed reputation as buccaneers, Pirate Capital specialises in ring public shots across the bows of companies it sees as badly-run. Its motto is surrender the booty, and the ofces feature a life-size pirate model. Last year, though, Mr Hudson was hit by a mutiny, with more than half his staff leaving and many investors withdrawing money. Specialises in global arbitrage and is said to take a longer term view of its investments than many of its peers. Best known for its global event driven strategy, PSAM also focuses increasingly on distressed assets. Medallion: 40% Mr Simons is the hedge fund managers hedge fund manager. Secret to the point of paranoia, Renaissances Medallion fund was long the most consistent strong performer in the industry, using quantitative analysis and computer-driven rapid-re trading across equities, bonds, currencies and commodities. The fund was so successful it pushed its fees to 5% a year and 44% of prots before ejecting external investors to concentrate on money from family and friends. A new fund started two years ago, though, is aiming to raise an astonishing $100bn by targeting the desire of institutional investors for returns of 10% a year with low volatility. 34% Top dog in the hedge fund world, Mr Cohen is one of most successful and talked-about traders. SACs phenomenal performance has made Mr Cohen one of the most valued, and richest, fund managers in the world. SAC has the highest fees in the industry, charging 3% a year and 50% of prots, but still has investors queueing up thanks to strong and consistent returns. It is one of the most prolic investors, making up a big chunk of stock market turnover, and recently moved into private equity. Mr Cohens sprawling Connecticut mansion - complete with skating rink, golf course and basketball court - and his $100m-plus art purchases have made him a poster child for the excesses of the hedge fund industry. Last year he faced a lawsuit from Biovail, a Canadian pharmaceutical company, which claimed $4.6bn and accused SAC and others of ghostwriting supposedly independent stock research to drive its shares down.
Pirate Capital
Tom Hudson
Norwalk, Conn
Activist, eventdriven
New York
Event-driven
$2.8bn $24bn
SAC Capital
Steven Cohen
Stamford, Conn.
Multi-strategy
$12bn
Name
Manager
Main Location(s)
Strategy
From Estonian steel to Michigan auto suppliers, Silver Point specialises in distressed situations and frequently ends up as owner or part-owner of bankrupt companies. The Goldman alumni who run it have become powerful figures in the distressed debt markets, although they invest across debt and equity. Mr Lichtenstein is a veteran activist investor not afraid to take board seats or take companies private. He is active globally, especially in Asia. Mr Loeb is an aggressive and outspoken activist investor whose public rants against companies he targets have become required reading on Wall Street. He badmouths executives and rival investors but his research into personal and corporate overlap - examples include naming executives in private boxes at sporting events and calling for chauffer-driven limos to be replaced by subway tickets - secures a loyal following.Event-driven investor who makes forays into activism several times a year via filings that are must-read on Wall Street. Another former Tiger cub, Mr Touradji had to close his respected Cataquil fund after an acrimonious legal battle with former partner Robert Ellis. But he remains a force to be reckoned with in the commodity markets, making big bets on everything from copper to coffee beans. Spun out of Texas Pacific private equity group 2 years ago, and run by former Goldman Sachs star A low-profile stockpicking firm run by two former Fidelity manager, Trafelet is known for the depth of its research - including paying students to count the vehicles in shopping centre car parks and visiting thousands of companies a year. Up 15% this year. Mr Tudor Jones is one of the most celebrated and long serving hedge fund managers. His $50m Connecticut waterfront estate is said to resemble Tara from Gone with the Wind. He is one of the many hedge fund managers actively engaged in charitable work. His Robin Hood foundation combates poverty in New York City. Gendell is part owner of the Cincinnati Reds baseball team. Last year was relatively disappointing after stellar performance in 2004 and 2005 based in no small part on bets on the homebuilding sector. Mr Soros is quite simply a legend. Even though he now spends much of his time on phjlanthropy and politics, the Hungarian-born investor remains a powerful force in the hedge fund business and earned almost $1billion last year. Much of his net worth resides in the Quantum endowment fund, which was up 12 per cent last year. Very active traders on a global basis; recently tried to buy Israels biggest mutual fund group, Psagot Ofek, from Bank Leumi
16.50% 15.00%
New York
$1.7bn
27.20%
Dinakar Singh Remy Trafelet, LC Kvaal Paul Tudor Jones Jeffrey Gendell George Soros
$6bn $5.7bn
14.90% 1%
Tudor
$15bn
18%
$7bn 11.3bn
9% 12%
York Capital
James Dinan
New York
event-driven
$9bn
13%
EUROPE FUNDS
Barclays Global Team-based Investors including Stan Beckers, Ken Kroner BlueBay Asset Management Hugh Willis, Mark Poole San Francisco, London Quantitative Hedged: $18.9bn Total: $1,800bn Hedged: $3.6bn, total $9.6bn n/a The low-key BGI, part of British bank Barclays, is among the worlds biggest hedge fund managers thanks to the extension of its quantitative, computer-assisted, long-only strategies into long-short equities, currencies, and bonds. One of Londons larger credit operators, BlueBay is driven by fundamental research but has taken activist positions in the past to defend distresssed debt investments. It joined the wave of listings by hedge fund managers last November, earning founders Mr Willis and Mr Poole 30m each in cash plus stakes then valued at 72m each.
London
Fixed income: investment grade, high yield and emerging markets Multi-strategy
BlueCrest Capital
London
$11.6bn
AllBlue 11.49% BlueCrest has successfully diversified from its roots in fixed income, moving into equities, currencies and managed futures as well as a listed fund of its own funds. With strong risk controls Messrs Platt and Reeves aim to replicate an investment bank prop desk. BlueCrest was the first spin-off from JP Morgan. but had a hiccup last August when big bond losses prompted the exit of a key trader and the closure of its Newport Beach, California office, its first venture overseas. Man Group bought a quarter of the firm in 2003, for 105m. Sark Fund: 21.3%, vol 3.78% Master Fund: 11.1% Zenit (SKr): 16.32% The two Emmanuels feature as key players in an increasing number of mid-market UK and French deals. They are also active in the capital markets, having floated the first main market listed hedge fund last year, in Amsterdam, raising 440m. They are also rare in using euros as their currency of choice for describing their size, against the dollars adopted by almost everyone else in the industry. The secretive Alan Howard is regarded as one of Londons best macro traders, producing more than 10% a year since setting up four years ago, in a poor environment for the macro style. He presides over a floor of semi-independent traders modelled on an investment bank prop desk. T Brummer is the biggest Nordic hedge fund manager, running a complex of funds held through minority stakes it acquires in new managers. Performance has been mixed over the years, with Zenit starting as one of the worlds best long-short funds but plummeting to two years of losses before recovering in 2005. Last year its $1bn Latitude macro fund had to shut down after disastrous wrong-way bets on British interest rates led to losses put at 31%. Cambridge Place is a big player in the structured credit markets, and rapidly diversifying into real estate too. It was one of the big losers from the US sub-prime crisis, with Caliber, its London-listed CDO investment vehicle, seeing net assets fall 22% in February alone, while its main fund was down about 2.5% in the month. Martin Finegold, one of the founders, previously set up and floated British sub-prime lender Kensington and set up an electronic network for financial advisors. Along with New Yorks Paulson & Co, Centaurus became the latest fund to be labelled a locust last year when the Dutch economy minister took umbrage at their attempt to break up local supermarket group Ahold and conglomerate Stork. Willing to resort to high profile legal action, Centaurus is also moving into private equity, working with buyout group Permira on a possible 4bn bid for Atos Origin, the French IT services company. One of the fastest growing fund managers of the past two years, Cheyne has gone from $2bn to $10bn as it expanded from its base strategy aiming for low volatility returns from investing in convertibles, and now runs special situations and long/short equity as well as being a big player in structured products such as CDOs. Currently trying to cope with negative publicity around the poor share price performance of Queens Walk, its listed CDO investment vehicle, which has suffered from the US sub-prime mortgage fallout.
1.6bn
London
$12.09bn
Multi-strategy
$4.4bn
London
$4bn
15.91%
Cheyne Capital
London
Multi-strategy
$11.2bn
Special Situations: 18.3% Long/short Credit: 12.03% Multi-strategy (unleveraged): 8.5%, plus 1.5% rebate
Name
Manager
Main Location(s)
Strategy
CQS
Michael Hintze
London
One of the handful of convertible bond arbitrage specialists that survived the implosion of the sector in 2005, CQS has diversied and is now a big player in the credit markets, as well as running a listed company specialising in loans for oil rigs. Mr Hintze himself also attracts headlines for his philanthropy - including a gallery named after himself and his wife at the Victoria & Albert Museum - and his controversial 2.5m loan to Britains Conservative Party.
London
Long-short equity
European Dollar Mr Armitage is one of the longest-standing British hedge fund managers, having set up with partner Bill (B1): 26.07% Bollinger, since retired, in 1994. Since then he has produced annual returns averaging more than 21% and stuck to the long-short equity space, although now with parallel long-only funds too. An innovative new fee structure gives investors a lower performance fee of 15% in exchange for a modied high watermark under which they pay fees on gains after a fall, although at a half-rate. With the old fee structure of 20% of prots no fee was paid on gains until net asset value passed its all-time high. 22% Ferox shot to tabloid newspaper fame when Mr Herrmann paid himself 11.4m in 2004, with the media storm heightened by his position as a world champion y sherman - who chose to name his fund after a cannibalistic trout. Mr Herrmann invited further interest this year when he sued Ernst & Young for ling company accounts on the wrong day - leading to a big donation to charity by the auditors. Ferox itself is one of a few funds to continue specialising in convertibles after the sector collapsed in 2005, a decision which paid off handsomely last year. SemperMacro was one of the highest prole launches of 2005, chaired by Mr Davies, former chairman of the BBC, and run by Mr Siva-Jothy, former head of the macro prop desk at Goldman Sachs. But investors pulled out in droves at the end of last year following poor performance, when an 18-month lock-up period expired. Semper lost more than $1bn to leave it with less than $500m, but the group has other assets too. Roger Guy is one of the handful of star fund managers successfully running both retail long-only money and hedge funds. In his case he has been so successful that he was able to spearhead a private equity-backed buy-out of Gartmore, where he is the single biggest fee earner and is said to be the biggest shareholder among the group of 20 staff involved in the deal. Londons second biggest hedge fund, GLG is aiming for the big time. GLG is emerging from the shadow of a long-running FSA investigation into convertible bond trading by star manager Philippe Jabre - which led to his exit to establish a new fund, along with a 750,000 ne - and a 1.2m ne from French regulators over similar trades. Co-chief executive Manny Roman, who arrived from Goldman Sachs in 2005, is recruiting heavily to expand into new areas and grow the long-only business, and GLG has become a big part of the London hedge fund establishment. It is 15% owned by Lehman Brothers. Bill Browder is a living example of the dangers of activist investing in emerging markets: he currently runs the biggest foreign fund in Russia from an ofce in Londons Covent Garden after his visa was cancelled in what he believes was political manoevring by companies he had attacked. Still, the ban has not hurt performance, while Mr Browders activism over a decade has helped foster corporate governance in what was long dubbed the wild East for investors. Mr Browder, an American, has deep ties to Russia through a Russian grandmother and a grandfather who ran the American communist party. The hedge arm of the Belgian bancassurer spent much of the past year in crisis mode, rebuilding after being severely battered by the convertibles storm of 2004-05. Assets collapsed from $5bn at the end of 2004 and all but one of the fund range was shut down, with a new line launched under new leadership last year. KBC has injected all its proprietary trading capital into the funds, said to be well over $100m, as a sign of condence that it can start again, and growth has restarted, with assets increasing 20% so far this year. Lansdowne is regularly rated as one of the best hedge fund managers in London, no doubt a key factor behind Morgan Stanleys decision to pay $300m last year for a 19% stake. It has started to build out from its long-short stockpicking speciality, setting up specialist nancial sector and global macro funds and a long-only product, but remains focused on UK and European long-short equities. Notable successes include building a big stake in Manchester United Football Club ahead of its takeover, and recruiting Arnab Banerji, former economic adviser to Tony Blair. Started as an in-house fund for JP Morgan in the mid-1990s, LDFM was spun out in 2002, although the bank is thought to have continued investing with its former xed income team, regarded as among the best in the City. Mr Gorton keeps a low prole even by hedge fund standards but briey stuck his head above the parapet when he went public with his support for the campaign against a European constitution.
Ferox Capital
Jeremy Herrmann
London
Convertible arbitrage
$1.9bn
Global Macro
Gartmore
Long-short equity
GLG Partners
Multi-strategy
Market Neutral: 25.6%; European Long-Short: 17.1%; Emerging Markets: 59.9% 38.60%
Russia activist
$3.2bn
London
$1bn
Diversied: May-Dec: 9.13% annualised: 14.01%* European Equity: 15.82% UK Equity (): 23.24%
Lansdowne Partners
London
David Gorton
London
Fixed Income
$3.22bn
5.76%
Tim Wong
London
Managed futures
Hedged: AHL Diversied: AHL, a computerised trend-follower, is the agship division of the Man Group, the biggest listed hedge $18.8bn. Total: 6.4% fund manager and a member of the FTSE 100 index. AHL suffered badly from the market rout at the end of $60bn February and during March as the notoriously volatile managed futures sector was hit by uncertainty spread across the equities, bonds, currencies, and commodities they trade. AHL remains down for the year, but Man can fall back on a range of smaller funds, its stake in BlueCrest and a range of funds of hedge funds, all of which it sells through packaged or guaranteed products. The group itself has just changed leadership with the well-known Stanley Fink moving to a non-executive job and Peter Clarke, nance director, replacing him as chief executive. Man is best-known outside hedge funds for sponsoring the Booker Prize but is also big on corporate philanthropy, pledging a proportion of fees to charity. $11.5bn Eureka: 24.45% Marshall Wace shot to public prominence last year when it launched the biggest-ever hedge fund listing, raising 1.5bn in Amsterdam for its Trade Optimised Portfolio System, which lters broker tips to decide investments. Tops prompted suspicions from rivals that commission rewards for the best tippers could lead brokers to bend the rules but it was given a green light by regulators, and Marshall Wace has extended the system to cover Asia and the US, with a global version being launched. It also has the more conventionally run Eureka fund. Paul Marshall has stepped back from day to day money management to focus on running the company, and is a big donor to the Liberal Democrats, as well as chairing a liberal think tank. Philippe Jabre earned notoriety last year when he was given a record personal ne by British regulators over trading in convertible bonds while he was working at GLG. But his reputation as one of Europes best fund managers survived intact and investors stuck with him when he decided to move to Geneva and open his own fund. He raised more than $1bn at launch this year, and is aiming for $2.5bn, including parallel long-only funds, by the end of the year. 23.30% Polygon shot to instant City fame in 2004 when it unsuccessfully tried to block a 5bn government-backed restructuring of British Energy, the struggling nuclear generator. It proved its activist credentials - even as it insisted it hates the activist label - when it blocked an agreed bid by rival Fortress for Marconi rump Telent. But it came to wider public attention only last year when it entered takeover talks, eventually abandoned, for Newcastle United Football Club. Has just raised $300m for Tetragon, a $930m fund investing in the equity portion of collaterised debt obligations, which it describes as a synthetic bank.
Marshall Wace
London
Long/short equity
Philippe Jabre
Geneva
Polygon Invest- Reade Grifth, London and New York ments Alexander Jackson, Paddy Dear
Multi-strategy
$5.9bn
Name
Manager
Main Location(s)
Strategy
RAB Capital
Philip Richards
London
RABs focus on mining and energy stocks has made its Special Situations fund a top performer in the industry, but the acquisitive group - run by Mr Richards and Michael Alen-Buckley and named for their initials - is also expanding rapidly into other long/short strategies and xed income. RAB is listed on Londons Aim market and is keen to use its shares as an acquisition currency, while the company has also proved appealing to billionaire steel magnate Lakshmi Mittal, whose family trusts hold 8 per cent. Offbeat investments include Ethiopian forestry and the A1 motor racing league, while Mr Richards has attracted headlines for philanthropy, giving 4.6m to charities and his church last year. Red Kite is one of the biggest players in the base metals markets, with rumours that it was in trouble earlier this year prompting a 9% fall in zinc prices in a day. Mr Farmer and Mr Lilley - dubbed the God squad by metals traders for their evangelical Christianity - produced phenomenal returns from betting the right way on copper last year, although they suffered badly in January as the metals value plummeted. Traders believe they built up a massive position in aluminium too this year, although it is unclear whether that has paid off. One of Londons oldest hedge funds, Sloane Robinson has stuck to its long/short strategy since starting up in 1993 - with great success. Its approach of investing for 1-3 years has produced solid double-digit annual returns and given the partners a reputation for knowing their way round Asias emerging markets. SR has also distinguished itself by publicly rejecting the diversication into multi-strategy of most of their large peers, while Messrs Sloane and Robinson have attracted attention for philanthropic activities, including a 6m investment in Oxfords Keble College. Europes best-known activist, Chris Hohn sent shockwaves through cozy European corporate management when he and a group of allies brought down Deutsche Borses bid for the London Stock Exchange and forced the resignation of Rolf Breuer, its chairman. Ignoring accusations from German politicians that he is a locust, this year he launched an assault on ABN Amro, shortly before Britains Barclays launched a bid for the Dutch bank. But Mr Hohn is equally well known as Britains most generous philanthropist, giving away 50m in 2004-2005, as TCI automatically gives a big chunk of its fees to a childrens charity run by his wife, Jamie Cooper-Hohn.
Red Kite
Michael Farmer, London and New York David Lilley, Oskar Lenowski, David Waite Hugh Sloane, George Robinson, Richard ChenevixTrench Chris Hohn London
Commodities
>$1bn
Metals: 190%
Sloane Robinson
SR GlobalInternational: 20.8%
London
Activist
$10.3bn
Charlie Porter
London
Thames River had a strategic setback last year when it abandoned plans to oat, losing its chief executive and one of its co-founders in the process and seeing its nance director go part-time. The company, backed by entrepreneur Sir John Beckwith, has built a solid franchise with its long-only and funds of hedge funds in the UK, in addition to a successful range of long-short funds and Nevsky, the $1.4bn emerging markets fund split off late last year. Nevsky ended the year up 44%, its sixth year of gains above 28%, as it rode the boom in the Russian and Chinese markets. Londons Tiger cub. Martin Hughes, a plain-spoken former acolyte of Julian Robertson at his Tiger Management, is a nancial sector specialist and behind-the-scenes activist who occasionally emerges into the limelight with public attacks on companies. Most recently Tosca added its voice to criticism of ABN Amro and called for a merger, while its undisclosed stake in Prudential has led to hopes among other investors that Mr Hughes will try to shake up the underperforming British insurer. Tosca also holds big stakes in broker Collins Stewart and project manager Amec. Mr Hughes himself has begun to diversify, with his Old Oak holding company buying Cheviot Capital, a private client asset manager, while he beefed up his team by bringing in former Royal Bank of Scotland chairman Sir George Mathewson and Fred Watt, RBSs ex-nance director, as non-executives. Vega, originally backed by Spains Banco Santander, has had a dire 12 months. A series of bearish wrongway bets on bonds by Mr Mehra has seen the fund manager lose not only its position as Europes biggest hedge fund three years ago, when it had $12bn, but also more than half its investors. As of the end of September it had $5bn left but it remains unclear how many more withdrew money after the agship higher-risk fund plummeted 10.6% that month.
Toscafund
Martin Hughes
London
Long-short equity
$5bn
21.80%
Global macro
ASIA FUNDS
Basis Capital Steve Howell, Stuart Fowler Sydney Relative value, long-short credit, structured credit Distressed debt, special situations $923m Pac-rim Opportunity: 12.82% Steve Howell is a highly visible gure on the Sydney hedge funds scene, having shaved his head for charity and played drums on stage during the industrys annual Hedge Funds Rock fund-raiser. No doubt his prole has helped sales with the Australian retail investors who make up the bulk of the rms clients, but solid performance has helped Basis gain a respectable international following too.
ADM Capital
$2bn
Galleus: 2.01% ADM was set up immediately after the 1998 Asian nancial crisis to buy up distressed securities in the region, and prospered until last year, when write-downs of a couple of major investments led to performance well below its 15% target. It runs a range of closed-end funds with the support of the Asian Development Bank and last year it expanded into Europe, looking for distressed opportunities on the continent. Rarely for a hedge fund it aims to invest based on ecologically sound principles - including naming its funds after threatened sh species. Last year the partners set up a charity to support marine ecology, along with other environmental causes and children. Barracuda: 8.7% Artradis looks for inefcient pricing in Asian securities, giving it a market-neutral approach. It tends to be long volatility, damping performance in the past year, although it emerged well from last Mays big correction, when many hedge funds were hammered. Has just expanded into Russia with a fund run by Mr Diggles brother. LIM is one of the oldest Asian funds and has diversied its range to include country-specic China and Japan funds and long-only funds. It is not afraid to push the boundaries, launching the regions rst property hedge fund. Platinum does not describe itself as a hedge fund, but most of its funds are hedged to some degree. The rm - seeded by George Soros - is a hit with Australian retail investors, helped by strong performance, offbeat advertising and a chatty style that includes online holiday snaps posted by its fund managers. But Mr Neilsons value approach and stock-picking skills also make him popular with international hedge fund investors. Last year was tough for its agship thanks to an overly cautious approach and an unsuccessful bet on Japan, but that has not stopped the group going ahead with plans to list. Asias biggest hedge fund manager has grand ambitions. Mr Abe listed the group on Jasdaq in 2001, 12 years after it set up, and has consolidated its lead in Asia by buying Hong Kongs PMA Capital, the regions number two, last summer. It has moved away from its core long-short strategy with activist, private equity and big long-only funds as well as setting up funds of hedge funds. Tantallon fund: 12.99% Named after a ruined castle in Scotland, Tantallon is one of the larger Asia-based hedge shops. The main fund uses top-down themes to identify sectors for investments, with equal weight given to fundamental corporate analysis for individual stocks. It also runs a fund focused on the fashionable Bric economies and an Asian smaller companies fund. Winnington has grown rapidly in the past couple of years thanks to its focus on greater China, increasing assets by a third already this year. It has successfully ridden the bull market in Chinese shares, and weathered the collapse in the local market at the end of February thanks to well-placed derivatives, which left it up slightly for the month. Still, Trophy remains a very high-risk fund, as shown by its 26% fall during 2005, and the company has just set up a lower volatility version. It also plans a property fund investing in China.
Singapore
Relative value
$1bn
LIM Advisors
Hong Kong
Multi-strategy
$750m
Sydney
Long-short equity
Total inc long- International only A$22.2bn Fund (A$): ($18.4bn) 6.5%
Sparx Group
Shuhei Abe
Tokyo
Multi-strategy
Tantallon Capital
Long-short equity
Winnington Capital
Kenneth Hung
Hong Kong
Long-short equity
$300m
Trophy: 366%