Eines getraue ich mich schon prophezeien - in ein paar Jahren wird
Wall Street wieder agieren wie eh
und je.
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Hedge-Fund Startups Sprout as Roc Capital Gathers $1
Billion
By Saijel Kishan and Katherine Burton
June 16 (Bloomberg) -- Arvind
Raghunathan, former head of
Deutsche Bank AG’s global arbitrage business, will open his new
hedge-fund firm next month with more than $1 billion, a sign
that investors are trickling back
after record losses last year.
Roc Capital Management LP’s assets will include $500
million in a separate account from Deutsche Bank, according to
people familiar with the New
York-based firm, who asked not to
be identified because the information is private. It’s the
largest hedge-fund startup this year, one of at least eight
expected to raise more than $250
million each, according to
brokers who provide credit and lend securities to managers.
The
ventures are being set up by executives who left banks
that scaled back trading to conserve capital,
or hedge funds
whose 2008 losses will limit bonuses for at least another year.
Investors see
them as an opportunity to get in early with the
next George Soros or Paul Tudor Jones, who have
outperformed
rivals for most of their careers.
“In the past month we have started to see
family offices
and institutions request information about high-quality
launches,” said Emma
Sugarman, head of U.S. capital
introductions at BNP Paribas SA in New York. “These groups tell
us they are looking for the next generation of talent.”
Fear
Subsides
The expectation of money coming in is spurring traders to
open their own
shops. Jayesh Punater, chief executive officer of
New York-based Gravitas Technology, which provides
systems and
consulting services to financial firms, said he met with 19 new
hedge funds in the
first three months of the year, and more than
that this quarter.
“The fear seems to be
over,” after last year’s average
loss of about 20 percent, he said. “There’s a lot of
money
sitting on the sidelines and waiting to be allocated.”
Tony Chedraoui, a former
portfolio manager at Deephaven
Capital Management, is starting London-based Tyrus Capital LLP
in October with at least $500 million, according to two people
familiar with the matter.
Chedraoui managed about $1.5 billion at Deephaven,
including its $500 million European event fund,
the only fund
that Deephaven didn’t sell to St. Francis, Wisconsin-based hedge
fund firm
Stark & Roth Inc. in January when it closed. Money
from the European fund was returned to clients,
most of whom are
likely to invest in Chedraoui’s London-based fund, the people
said.
Performance Improves
Money is beginning to flow into funds as
performance
rebounds this year, with returns averaging 9.8 percent through
May, according to
index published by Chicago-based Hedge Fund
Research Inc. The industry had net inflows of $1.5
billion in
May, the first gain in 10 months, Singapore-based Eurekahedge
Pte said.
Roc
Capital is starting with more than 20 employees. The
group lost 1 percent last year, beating most
quantitative funds,
which posted an average loss of 23 percent in 2008, according to
Hedge Fund
Research. Quant funds use computer models to select
investments.
Josh Berkowitz, Marcel
Kasumovich and three partners
started Woodbine Capital Advisors LP, a global macro fund that
trades stocks, bonds, currencies and commodities, in January
with about $180 million after leaving
Soros Fund Management LLC.
They will be running about $700 million by July, according to
people
familiar with the New York-based firm.
Executives at the firms all declined to comment, as
did
Michele Allison, a New York-based spokeswoman for Deutsche Bank.
While more money is
coming into the industry after two
quarters of outflows, established managers are the largest
beneficiaries.
“Nearly every established fund is now open for investment,
including
some that were previously hard closed for years, so
there is a tremendous competition for
capital,” said Charlotte
Burkeman, New York-based global head of capital introduction at
UBS
AG.
Talent Emerges
Neil Paragiri, a New York-based
managing director at
Harcourt Investment Consulting AG, which invests about $4
billion of
client money in hedge funds, said he’s meeting new
managers and is seeing “strong” talent
emerging from the
proprietary desks of investments banks.
“It’s a good opportunity for
them to start a new fund now
given the dislocation in the markets, especially for distressed
debt and equity strategies,” he said.
Track Record
A Deutsche Bank survey in March found investors were more
reluctant to invest in new hedge funds,
yet more than 30 percent
were willing to consider startups run by managers with a
verifiable
track record from their former employers.
To attract money, new funds are being more investor
friendly than industry veterans, said Vineet Kapur, managing
director and head of U.S. capital
introductions at Morgan
Stanley in New York.
Management fees for new stock funds are
tending toward 1.5
percent of assets, rather than the traditional 2 percent. The
new funds are
making it easier for investors to pull their
money, and aren’t including clauses in their
documents that let
them limit withdrawals or create sub-portfolios for hard-to-sell
assets.
“There’s an entrepreneurial spirit emerging out of the
ashes following the fallout in the
fourth quarter,” said
Philippe Peress, a former Fortress Investment Group LLC
portfolio
manager who is starting his own hedge fund, Harness
Investment Group in London.
Below
is a list of some of the hedge funds that plan to
open this year.
*T
Founders
Firm Start* Amount Raised
A. Raghunathan Roc Capital July
$1.2 billion
Tony Chedraoui Tyrus Capital October +$500 million
Josh
Berkowitz Woodbine Capital January $180 million
Marcel Kasumovich
Boaz
Weinstein Saba Capital August $160 million**
Stephen Jamison Jamison Capital
April +$150 million
Hari Kumar LionRock Capital June $75 million
Nick
Taylor Senrigan Capital September $50 million
Philippe Peress Harness
Investment July-Aug. $50 million
Jonathan Ratcliffe
Shafiq Karmali Cypress Lane
August NA
Pav Sethi Gladius Investment June NA
Gentry Beach
Vollero Beach June NA
Rob Vollero
Edwin Wong SSG Capital
April NA
Andrew Gale Cavenagh Capital June NA
Lee Ka Shao
*Scheduled start date
**As of June 1
NA - Not available
Source: Bloomberg News