Funds Hub
Money managers under the microscope
Morning Line-Up: CDS, TCI, Balfour
News and views on the asset management industry from Reuters and elsewhere:
Hedge funds bet against euro, shirk CDS, in crisis – Reuters
Massachusetts regulator subpoenas Guidepoint Global – Reuters
TCI accounts reveal impact of financial crisis – FT
Hedge funds flock back to Asia – WSJ
Hedging breakdown drives investors to managed futures funds – WSJ
Balfour to launch £1 bln infrastructure fund – FT
New wave of hedge fund start-ups find life is tough – Reuters
Child’s play
Getting information out of secretive hedge fund firm TCI (The Children’s Investment fund) can be a difficult task — just ask the Treasury Select Committee, whose tough questioning of founder Chris Hohn in January was met with short responses.
However, it appears the activist firm has been on the move, hiring Masroor Siddiqui, head of the European business at Canyon Capital.
A kick up the…
It seems the UK Treasury Select Committee’s very public chastisement of the hedge fund industry in January has had some effect.
At the time, MPs zeroed in on the Hedge Fund Standards Board (HFSB) in particular and the relatively small number of funds it had signed up — 33 in December — even though these funds accounted for half of the European industry.
Hedge fund diversification
Tuesday’s Treasury Select Committee grilling of the hedge fund industry proved a lively affair (if somewhat hot in a crammed Westminster room), but you have to wonder how well diversified their choice of witnesses is.
As well as Chris Hohn, co-founder of TCI, the Committee picked BlackRock’s head of alternatives Douglas Shaw — a previous employee of TCI.
Has the moment for greater UK hedge fund regulation passed?
Tuesday’s grilling of UK hedge fund executives is likely to create plenty of noise but produce little in the way of new rules.
While media-shy TCI founder Chris Hohn and others will face tough questions from the Treasury Select Committee on financial stability, short-selling and other issues, it nevertheless seems that the pro-legislation lobby’s position may be weaker than it has been in recent years.
