Raising Capital for a Fund Startup

This article below was first published on HedgeFundStartupGuru.com. Last week I moderated a panel discussion in new york on capital raising and how starting a fund is really starting a small business. The discussions were great and while everyone knows that capital is hard to raise some good tips and investor feedback came out of the event. We hope to do more of these in the future, stay tuned for Hedge Fund Group (HFG) event announcements for Chicago next month and Moscow, Russia this September. Below please find an article on hedge funds tar

The gyrating financial markets have proven difficult for even the most experienced alternative-investment managers to navigate over the last year, but startup hedge funds and commodity trading advisors now confront an even tougher challenge: convincing investors to entrust them with their money.

In the wake of 2008 - the hedge fund industry's worst year on record - fledgling funds face gun-shy investors and tougher competition for the assets that are available, amid a fickle market that has made it tough to put up the numbers that made hedge funds famous. Adding to the problem are the effects of ... source

For related resources please see HedgeFundStartupGuru.com, ThirdPartyMarketing.com and our own Hedge Fund Marketing & Sales Guide and Hedge Fund Startup Guides.

Take advantage of over $3,000 worth of consulting advice on how to start a hedge fund for just $17 within our e-book which may be found at http://StartAHedgeFundNow.com

Related to Raising Capital for a Fund Startup

Tags: Hedge Fund, Raising capital, capital, hedge funds, private equity, alternative investments, starting a fund, raising capital for a new fund, fundraising tips and advice

Third Party Marketing & Placement Agent Restrictions

Third Party Marketing Restrictions

The following article was first published on ThirdPartyMarketing.com, now the #1 most widely visited website on fund marketing and sales. The third party marketing industry has been battered over the past 6 months with dozens of reports of un-ethical or illegal kickbacks being provided to third party marketing agents, placements agents and those in control of funds at large institutional investors. This is the first public black mark for the third party marketing industry in several years and many large investor groups are now reviewing the rules surrounding the use of placement agents. In the past full disclosure was adequate to 99% of investors, but now some are not looking at funds which use such agents. Here is a related about this trend:

Legislative leaders have agreed to spend up to $100,000 to help pay for an independent review of New Mexico's investment practices and policies.

Questions have been raised about investments of public money because of millions of dollars in fees paid to third-party marketing and placement agents by firms that won investment business with the State Investment Council and an educational retirement fund.

Lawmakers are also troubled by billions of dollars in losses in pension and investment funds during the past year as financial market deteriorated.

The Legislative Council, a group of House and Senate leaders, directed its staff on Wednesday to solicit bids from firms interested in doing a wide-ranging examination of the State Investment Council and agencies that administer public pension funds, the Educational Retirement Board and the Public Employees Retirement Association.

The agencies manage funds valued at $25 billion at the end of March.

Gov. Bill Richardson's administration is jointly commissioning the investment review with the Legislature, and the executive branch will provide up to $200,000. source

Benefit from over $140,000 worth of free consulting advice found within our Hedge Fund Marketing & Sales Guide.

Related to Third Party Marketing & Placement Agent Restrictions

Tags: third party marketing, hedge funds, hedge fund, alternative investments, placement agents, third party marketing rules and regulations, restrictions on placement agents

3 Key Issues Facing Prime Brokerage Firms

3 Issues Facing Prime Brokers

The following post first appeared on PrimeBrokerageGuide.com, the #1 website on prime brokerage.

Just found a great article on the prime brokerage business and what challenges they face right now. The article suggests that there are three key issues facing prime brokers right now and provides some advice on how to face those challenges. Below is a short excerpt from this article and link to the full text.

As historic flows of hedge fund redemptions draw worldwide attention, prime brokerages face stiff competition for assets under management. Accenture believes that in order to adapt to the current downturn and position for high performance when the market rebounds, prime brokerages face three key imperatives.
Strengthen Core Business Capabilities
Build A Client Centric Organization
Focus on Operational Efficiency
Read more...

Learn more about Prime Brokerage.

Related to 3 Key Issues Facing Prime Brokerage Firms

Tags: prime brokerage regulation, prime broker, prime brokerage, prime brokerage trends, news on prime brokers, hedge fund, hedge funds

Prime Brokerage Industry Changes & Acquisitions

Prime Brokerage Industry Changes

The following articles was initially published on PrimeBrokerageGuide.com. The number of stories coming out about prime brokerage hirings, acquisitions, and office moves has doubled over the past two years. This industry is going through some huge changes right now. Here is a recent article out on CitiGroup and Bank of America making changes to their platforms.

Citigroup (C) and Bank of America (BAC) are boosting their prime brokerage groups to take advantage of disruption in the business amid the financial crisis, according to published reports.

Prime brokerage is the business of providing trading and lending services to hedge funds. Citi has added 18 people this year to its global prime brokerage operations, The Wall Street Journal says. BofA, through its recent acquisition of Merrill Lynch, plans to hire 40 employees for its global financing business. The 800-person group includes prime brokerage and securities lending, among other businesses, the Journal says.

Goldman Sachs (GS) and Morgan Stanley (MS) have long been the leaders in prime brokerage, the article says. But others, including Citi and BofA had been looking to expand their business for several years now. source

Learn more at http://PrimeBrokerageGuide.com

Related to Prime Brokerage Industry Changes & Acquisitions

Tags: prime broker, prime brokerage, prime brokerage industry, prime brokers, prime broker acquisitions, prime brokerage statistics

The Demise of Hedge Funds

This video below talks about out Bull Path Capital Management and how they have converted their hedge fund into a mutual fund. While this is great free advertising for Bull Path, this is a misleading video about the hedge fund industry. We had over 100 professionals attend our hedge fund startup event in New York last week, one of the most popular articles on my website is on hedge fund startups, and last week a report showed that more hedge funds are starting right now than any other time within the past 3 years. I should have this line be the tagline of my whole blog: "I believe that hedge funds will be stronger than ever in just 3 years."

Click on the image below to watch a video by Bloomberg on the "Demise of Hedge Funds."

View over 100 videos on hedge funds within our Hedge Fund Video Library.

Related to The Demise of Hedge Funds

Tags: Demise of hedge funds, hedge fund, hedge funds, alternative investments, investing, investments, mutual fund, hedge fund mutual funds, long short mutual funds

Changes to HedgeFundBlogger.com & Hedge Fund Group (HFG)

Our firm is going through a transition from simply offering a blog and some networking events to employing a team of professionals who provide more value to the community through additional speaking engagements, video content, specialized guides, larger Q & A sections of our websites, capital raising related services, and educational networking meetings held on set dates 5-6 times/year.

One change which we are hoping to release this summer/fall is Hedge Fund Group (HFG) Premium. This will be a $10-$15/month membership group which will gain access to our networking events, exclusive video content, audio files, interviews and guides. If you have any feedback on what you would like to see included or adding to such a membership please email me directly at Richard@HedgeFundGroup.org.

Below are links to the sites and resources connected to our firm:

Hedge Fund ETFs | Video Explanation

Here is a short video with IndexIQ which offers a hedge fund ETF product. This video provides a pretty good high level explanation of the product. Discussions around how legitimate these products are surfaced at both of the last two hedge fund conferences I attended. If you are viewing this article via email please click here to watch the embedded video below.

View over 100 videos on hedge funds within our Hedge Fund Video Library.

Related to Hedge Fund ETFs | Video Explanation

Tags: hedge fund, etfs, etf, hedge funds, alternative investments, hedge fund news, investment, stock market, stocks

New Hedge Funds Launched in 2009

Here is a great video put out by Bloomberg on how hedge funds are being started almost every day. The news caster is quoted as saying that 8 hedge funds are being started in July 2009 which will manage over $2B total. While I'm sure that this reporter is trying to stress that these are not all small hedge fund shops, I can assure you that there are far more than 18 hedge funds launching in July. Capital for these hedge funds is coming from seed capital providers, large banks and institutions looking to benefit from the cyclical nature of the markets. Many of these new funds are using managed accounts to provide banks with more transparency and less liquidity risk. If you are viewing this article via email please click here to watch the embedded video below.

View over 100 videos on hedge funds within our Hedge Fund Video Library.

Related to New Hedge Funds Launched in 2009

Tags: New Hedge Funds, hedge fund, hedge funds, alternative investments, stocks, investments, investing

13F Analysis of Paulson's Company

Paulson & Company

Below please find a 13F analysis report for Paulson & Company for Q1 2009. 13F analyses are reports that fund managers with over $100M are required to submit to the SEC, they are publicly available and these reports provide us with some insights on what some hedge fund managers have been investing in.

Paulson & Co. (PCI) is an employee owned hedge fund sponsor. Founded by John Alfred Paulson, the firm primarily provides its services to pooled investment vehicles. The firm invests in the public equity markets across the globe and employs strategies such as merger arbitrage, long/short, and event-driven strategy to make its investments. It employs fundamental analysis to make its investments. Paulson & Co. was founded in July 1994 and is based in New York, New York.

As of the most recent 13F filing completed by Paulson & Company their holdings included:

• (Au) Anglo gold Ashanti Ltd
• (BSX) Boston Scientific Group
• (GDX) Market Vectors Gold Miners ETF
• (GFI) Gold Fields LTD
• (GLD) SPDR Gold Trust
• (JPM) JP Morgan Chase & Company
• (KGC) Kinross Gold Corp
• (MIR) Mirant Corp
• (PCZ) Petro Canada
• (PM) Philip Moris International
• (ROH) Rohm & Hass
• (SGP) Schering Plough Corp
• (STJ) ST Jude Medical
• (T) AT&T
• (WYE) Wyeth

Using the TickerSpy portfolio analysis tool the graph to the left was created showing the approximate equity performance for Paulson & Company over the previous six months. According to this analysis Paulson & Company‘s equity picks have been underperforming against the S & P 500 recently.

The top 5 highest performing equities which Paulson & Company held as of this 13F filing include (PCZ), (MIR), (JPM), (PM) and (BSX)

According to AlpaClone data on Paulson & Company 26% of their equity portfolio is invested within the Health Care sector and 40% in Financial. The total equity value of Paulson & Company is 9B+, their total number of reported holdings is 25, and over 89.7% of the market value of this portfolio is represented within the top 10 holdings.

For more information on Paulson& Company please see the HedgeFundBlogger.com Hedge Fund Tracker Profile on Paulson & Company by clicking here .

Related to: Paulson & Company

Tags:13F analysis Paulson& Company,Paulson& Company's holdings, Paulson& Company's fund, Paulson& Company 13F filing, 13F, hedge fund, hedge funds, alternative investments

13F Analysis Atticus Capital Holdings

Atticus Capital

Below please find a 13F analysis report for Atticus Capital for Q1 2009.13F analyses are reports that fund managers with over $100M are required to submit to the SEC, they are publicly available and these reports provide us with some insights on what some hedge fund managers have been investing in.

Atticus Capital, LLC, is a leading investment management firm founded by Timothy Barakett in 1995. Headquartered in New York, the firm invests in global securities markets on behalf of major institutions, endowments, pension funds, and private investors. Timothy Barakett, Chairman and CEO, and David Slager, Senior Managing Director, lead the firm’s portfolio management team.

As of the most recent 13F filing completed by Atticus Capital their holdings included:

• (MA) Master Card
• (NOK) Nokia Corp
• (V) Visa
• (WYE) Wyeth

Using the TickerSpy portfolio analysis tool the graph to the left was created showing the approximate Atticus Capital's equity performance for over the previous six months. According to this analysis Atticus Capital's equity picks have been underperforming against the S & P 500 recently.

The top 5 highest performing equities which Atticus Capital held as of this 13F filing include (MA), (NOK), (V),and (WYE)

According to AlpaClone data on Atticus Capital 81% of their equity portfolio is invested within the health sector ,5% in technology sector. The total equity value of Atticus Capital is 70M+, their total number of reported holdings is 4, and over 100% of the market value of this portfolio is represented within the top 10 holdings.

For more information on Atticus Capital please see the HedgeFundBlogger.com Hedge Fund Tracker Profile on Atticus Capital by clicking here.

Related to: Atticus Capital

Tags:13F analysis Atticus Capital, Atticus Capital's holdings, Atticus Capital, Atticus Capital,13F filing,alternative investments

Hedge Fund Marketing Training Event in New York City

NYC Hedge Fund Marketing Seminar May 4th

The Hedge Fund Group is hosting a NYC Hedge Fund Marketing Seminar and Boston Hedge Fund Networking Event on Tuesday May 4th and Thursday 6th, 2010. To learn more about the Boston event please click here. To learn more about the NYC event please read below:

The Hedge Fund Group and TradeStation Prime Services are teaming up to offer a half day Hedge Fund Marketing Seminar on Tuesday May 4th, 2010 from 8AM to 1PM EST. This seminar will include breakfast, four introductory speeches lasting for 15-30 minutes each, a coffee break, and then a two hour hedge fund marketing training session taught by Richard Wilson.

What You Will Get At This Hedge Fund Marketing Seminar:

How to create Hedge Fund Marketing Feedback Systems so you are not "flying blind" while raising capital and reporting results to fund principals and stakeholders
Persuasive email and marketing material writing for capital raising
Direct advice from multiple capital introduction professionals who have raised over $200M in capital for their clients
Leveraging scientifically backed methods of influence and persuasion into every day hedge fund marketer and third party marketing activities

What: Half Day Hedge Fund Marketing Training Seminar including 5 speakers.

Where: Crosby Hotel (Address Below)

79 Crosby Street

New York, NY 10012

When: Tuesday May 4th. The event will run from 8AM until 1PM EST

Cost: $175 (Includes breakfast + 5 Speakers)

This event location has 100 seats and to date 40 of these seats have already been filled. As of today on April 23rd, 2010 we have 60 seats left available for this seminar. To register for one of these 60 spaces left available at the event please pay via credit card online by clicking here or complete our Fax Registration Form and submit this form to our team.

If you don't believe that you get over $175 worth of value at this event we will give you 100% of your money back. We are sure you will benefit from the practical tips and strategies that you can take away from this event and immediately implement to raise more capital.

If you have any questions please email me directly at Richard@HedgeFundGroup.org.

Related to: Hedge Fund Marketing Seminar in New York City

Boston Hedge Fund Networking Event on Thursday May 6th, 2010

Tags: New York City Hedge Fund Marketing Training, Hedge Fund Marketing Seminar, Hedge Fund Marketing Seminar

Hedge Fund PowerPoint Improvement Tips

One of the more frequent questions that we get through the prime brokerage firm I am with and through the Hedge Fund Consulting Group is about how to improve PowerPoint presentations so that managers can more effectively raise assets from wealth managers, family offices and institutions. The advice is always different based on the strategy, targeted channel of capital and current state of marketing materials but there are common threads which come up within every conversation.

Below please find a few of the most common tips which I often provide to fund managers looking to improve their PowerPoint presentations:

Update your PowerPoint quarterly, most potential investors will have most likely already seen your one pager which is updated monthly. The presentation should mention your performance but the main purpose of it is to present your team's pedigree, investment process and risk controls. Hire a professional editor to spend 1 hour reviewing the presentation after each major review, this costs less than $100.

3 Areas of Focus: As mentioned within the bullet point above the three areas of focus within your presentation should be team pedigree and experience, investment process and risk controls. Many managers tend to be very high level while describing their investment process and risk controls, often times using terms which are seen too often within generic industry presentations. You have to let out enough of your secret sauce within your marketing materials so that others know there is actually something there. Solid returns alone, even within these recent markets is not enough, you must provide some explanation of your consistent process, system and parameters for operating. Please see the following bullet points for advice on each of the three most important sections of your PowerPoint presentation

Team Pedigree: Take the time to describe all of the relevant experience that your team holds and try to explain those experiences in ways that mesh well with your firm's investment process and approach to managing risk. Many times certain types of experience can be valuable to managing a portfolio of investments but many times that connection needs to be spelled out within the presentation. If after creating this section you realize that your team consists of just one or two professionals without a long industry track record consider beefing up your close advisory board with industry veterans and experts in risk and portfolio management. Many times investors will ask how much of a fund principal's own assets are invested within the funds, regardless of the exact dollar amount if 80-90%+ of your own liquid assets are invested within this fund check with your compliance officer about noting this within your presentation materials, many investors turn to hedge funds due to the alignment of interests and providing evidence of this within your fund sometimes helps. It is important to retain capital raising talent as well, but without proper portfolio and risk management professionals or advisory professionals in place you may just spin your wheels. As you expand your team make sure and include a team hierarchy tree to your presentation, this may include your advisory team and a few service providers or research groups which you work with daily and rely upon for operations.

Investment Process: This is the most common area of PowerPoint presentations which needs improvement. I have found it easiest to try to break your investment process into 3-5 steps which could then as appropriate be broken down further during a due diligence phone call or within meetings with potential investors. I would start with a single page displaying the 3-5 step investment process your firm uses, I would follow this by 1-2 pages explaining each step of the process in great detail. Described the tools you follow, the decision making process, research inputs, parameters for refining the universe of potential investments and triggers that may affect how the portfolio is constructed at each step. Following this consider adding another page to the PowerPoint on buy and sell decision triggers, when do you trim a position? When do you sell? When are positions cleared out completely? What stop loss provisions are in place? Providing a few trading case studies within this part of the PowerPoint may be helpful. Use real life examples from the previous quarter and update these frequently so that analysts will be able to read into your decisions in context of the recent market conditions.

Risk Management Techniques: Your risk management techniques can be placed within a separate section of the presentation or tacked on to the end of your investment process section within your PowerPoint. It is hard to go over-board on explaining with granularity what risk management techniques your firm employees. Start with the status quo, what tools, research, stop loss provisions and systems do you use? Next move on to proprietary models you may be using, exclusive trading research or experience which provides additional insight into how to manage risk within your portfolio.

More is More. It is often better to go overboard with details on your investment process and risk management details rather than not provide enough information. That said, never let your presentation grow to over 25 pages unless you have 3 or more products being presented within a single presentation. Getting your PowerPoint right is about balancing transparency and granularity with confusion and information-overload. Everyone is busy and often getting someone to invest 3 minutes to review your one pager can be a challenge of its own.

Creating a solid PowerPoint presentation is a task of continual improvement, but if you start with the tips above it should set you above 50% of the sub $200M hedge funds that we often speak with.

For dozens of additional marketing and sales resources please see our Hedge Fund Marketing Guide or visit http://ThirdPartyMarketing.com.

Related to Hedge Fund PowerPoint Improvement Tips

Fund Marketing and Sales Advice

Tags: Hedge Fund PowerPoint Presentation, Creating a Fund Marketing PowerPoint Presentation, Using PowerPoint to Create Marketing Materials, Investment Fund Marketing, hedge fund, hedge funds

Berkshire Hathway 13F Holdings Analysis Q1 2009

BERKSHIRE HATHWAY

Below please find a 13F analysis report for Berkshire Hathaway for Q1 2009. 13F analyses are reports that fund managers with over $100M are required to submit to the SEC, they are publicly available and these reports provide us with some insights on what some hedge fund managers have been investing in.

Berkshire Hathaway is a publicly traded holding company owning subsidiaries engaged in a number of diverse business activities. The company Chairman and CEO is Warren Buffet, one of the most highly regarded managers and investors in the world. Headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska, the company’s invested assets derive from shareholder capital as well as funds provided from policyholders through insurance and reinsurance businesses (“float”).

As of the most recent 13F filing completed by Berkshire Hathaway their holdings included:

• (AXP) American Express
• (BAC) Bank Of America
• (BNI) Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp
• (CDGO) Comdisco holding Compnay
• (CEG) Constellation Energy Group
• (CMCSK) Comcast Class A
• (COP) Conocco Phillips
• (COST) Costco Wholesale
• (ETN) Eaton Corp
• (GCI) Gannett Co
• (GE) General Electric co
• (GSK) GlaxoSmithklime Plc
• (HD) Home Depot
• (IR) Ingersoll rand
• (IRM) Iron Mountain
• (JNJ) Constellation Energy Group
• (KFT) Kraft Foods
• (KMX) Carmax Inc
• (KO)Coco cola Co
• (LOW)Lowes Companies
• (MCO) Moodys Corp
• (MTB)M&T Bank
• (NKE) Nike
• (NLC) NAlco Holding Company
• (NRG) Nrg Energy
• (NSC) Norfolk Southern Company
• (PG) Procter& GAmble
• (SNY) Sanofi-Aventis
• (STI) Suntrust Banks
• (TMK) Torchmark Corp
• (UNH) United Health Group
• (UNP) Union Pacific Corp
• (UPS) United Parcel Service
• (USB) US Bancorp
• (USG) USG Corp
• (WBC) WABCO Holdings
• (WFC) Wells Fargo & Company
• (WLP) Wellpoint
• (WMT) Wallmart Stores
• (WPO) Washington Post Co
• (WSC) Wesco Financial Group

Using the TickerSpy portfolio analysis tool the graph to the left was created showing the approximate Berkshire Hathaway's equity performance for over the previous six months. According to this analysis Berkshire Hathaway's equity picks have been outperforming against the S & P 500 recently.

The top 5 highest performing equities which Berkshire Hathaway held as of this 13F filing include (AXP), (BAC), (GCI), (IR) and (NRG).

According to AlpaClone data on Berkshire Hathaway 20% of their equity portfolio is invested within the financial sector ,13% in transportation sector. The total equity value of Berkshire Hathaway is 40B+, their total number of reported holdings is 41, and over 84.6% of the market value of this portfolio is represented within the top 10 holdings.

Related to: Berkshire Hathway

Tags:13F analysis Berkshire HathawayBerkshire Hathaway's holdings, Berkshire Hathaway, Berkshire Hathaway13F filing,alternative investments

Hedge Funds Gains to Date in 2009

Fixed income and mortgage backed arbitrage are coming out as two of the highest performing strategies in the industry. To date hedge funds have returned over 10% to investors while the S & P has returned just over 4 percent to date. Some of the worst performers to date in 2009? ABL Funds and commodity pools. Below is a video on these results, if you are reading this via email and cannot see the embedded video below please click here.

View over 100 videos on hedge funds within our Hedge Fund Video Library.

Related to Hedge Funds Gains to Date in 2009

Tags: Hedge Fund, Hedge Funds, performance in 2009, 2009, alternative investment fund performance, commodity, commodities, fixed income, deb, corporate deb, investments

13F Analysis of Carlson Capital Management

Carlson Capital Management

Below please find a 13F analysis report for Carlson Capital Management for Q1 2009. 13F analyses are reports that fund managers with over $100M are required to submit to the SEC, they are publicly available and these reports provide us with some insights on what some hedge fund managers have been investing in.

Carlson Capital LP is a Dallas based hedge fund founded in 1993 by Clint Carlson who currently serves as President and Chief Investment Officer. The firm serves as the investment advisor of the Black Diamond group of hedge funds and focuses on a non-directional, multi-strategy approach to the global market.

As of the most recent 13F filing completed by Carlson Capital Management their holdings included:

• (ABX) Barrick Gold Corp
• (COP) Conoco Phillips
• (EQ) Embarq Corp
• (FIS) Fidelity National Information Services
• (HK) Petro Hawk Energy Corp
• (HPQ) Hewlett Packyard Co
• (LMDIA) Liberty Media Corp
• (LSTR) Landstar System
• (SGP) Schering Plough Corp
• (SJM) Smucker JM co
• (V) Visa
• (WFT) Weatherford International
• (WMT) Walmart stores
• (WYE) Wyeth
• (XOM) Exon Mobile

Using the TickerSpy portfolio analysis tool the graph to the left was created showing the approximate Carlson Capital Management‘s equity performance for over the previous six months. According to this analysis Carlson Capital Management‘s equity picks have been underperforming against the S & P 500 recently.

The top 5 highest performing equities which Carlson Capital Management held as of this 13F filing include (Hk), (WFT), (FIS), (EQ) and (LMDIA)

According to AlpaClone data on Carlson Capital Management 18% of their equity portfolio is invested within the financial sector ,19% in service and as well as in technology sector. The total equity value of Carlson Capital Management is 1.5B+, their total number of reported holdings is 177, and over 20.8% of the market value of this portfolio is represented within the top 10 holdings.

For more information on Carlson Capital Management please see the HedgeFundBlogger.com Hedge Fund Tracker Profile on Carlson Capital Managment by clicking here.

Related to:Carlson Capital Management

Tags:13F analysis Carlson Capital Management, Carlson Capital Management's holdings, Carlson Capital Management fund, Carlson Capital Management13F filing

Multi-Prime Service Platform Predicted

SAN FRANCISCO, June 15 /PRNewswire/ -- The financial crisis of 2008 has upset the relatively stable equilibrium previously maintained between hedge fund managers and their traditional service providers, according to a white paper released today by Nirvana Solutions, provider of Nirvana (TM), a real-time portfolio management system for multi-prime hedge funds, prime brokers, and fund administrators.

The white paper, entitled "The New Model of Prime Brokerage - The Multi-Prime Service Platform," documents the dynamic changes to the hedge fund industry and its service providers in the aftermath of the 2008 market crash. Peter Curley, managing partner at Nirvana Solutions, examines how the roles of traditional service providers have changed, leading to the emergence of a new service model providing the full range of hedge fund services through a single, real-time multi-prime infrastructure built on a common, outsourced technology platform.

"The profound impact the crisis has had on hedge funds has already been well-documented," Curley said. "Another significant outcome of the crisis, we feel, will be the aggregation and convergence of services provided to hedge funds through a single service provider. This new service provider cannot be adequately described as a mini-prime or a fund administrator but rather a hybrid of both, a model we are calling The Multi-Prime Service Platform."

New requirements, such as multi-prime technology that can provide real-time views of critical data such as exposures and risk, and impending hedge fund regulation, are now converging to significantly increase the barriers to entry for new hedge fund managers. The operational efficiencies achieved through The Multi-Prime Service Platform promises to provide the critical sub-$500 million segment of the hedge fund industry-where the tension between the new requirements and the hedge funds' ability to pay is at its most intense-a cost effective, fully integrated solution providing real-time transparency in a multi-prime environment.

To download the white paper please visit: www.nirvanasolutions.com.

About Nirvana Solutions (www.nirvanasolutions.com):

Founded in 2006, Nirvana Solutions is a San Francisco based software company that provides real-time portfolio management systems to multi-prime hedge funds, prime brokers, and fund administrators. Nirvana(TM) is the hedge fund industry's first portfolio management system built around the Financial Information Exchange (FIX) protocol. The ability to dynamically accept FIX messages, combined with the aggregation of multi-prime data, ensures true real-time views of critical measures such as P&L and Risk. Nirvana's ability to offer real-time transparency is complemented by a full suite of on-demand and historical reporting. The Nirvana solution is made available in an easy-to-deploy Software as a Service (SaaS) model and can be implemented in a modular or complete fashion.

Related to Multi-Prime Service Platform Predicted

Tags: Prime Brokerage and fund administration, combination of fund administration and prime brokerage, prime brokers and fund administrators, top prime brokerage firms

Alternative Investment Marketing & Sales

Yesterday morning I completed my speech on “5 Best Practices for Hedge Fund Marketing” at the Marcus Evans Fund of Hedge Fund Summit in Boca Raton, Florida. I got connected with some great funds that I have never heard of before and also ran into a few followers of HedgeFundBlogger.com and FamilyOfficesGroup.com as well.

Below please find some of the most useful practical tips which I mentioned during my speech, the full video recording of the speech along with the PowerPoint will be available as part of the training materials within the Hedge Fund Group (HFG) hedge fund certification program within the Level 2 Module on Marketing & Sales.

1. Focus on Building Authority: The power of true authority within an industry trickles down and puts other influential factors into motion which help you develop valuable relationships

2. Move the Free Line: Give away your best ideas within press inquiries, books, interviews, articles, white papers and videos

3. Diverse Investor Case Studies: Have at least two case studies of investors choosing to place capital with your firm for each of the major distribution channels you are focusing on raising capital from. For example have six total case studies if 90% of your efforts are focused on family offices, wealth management firms, and HNW individual selling.

4. The 4 P’s of Marketing Materials: Focus on Pedigree, Process (USP), Portfolio Risk, and Presentation Quality

For more resources please see our Hedge Fund Marketing and Sales Guide

Related to Alternative Investment Marketing & Sales

Tags: Alternative Investments, hedge fund, hedge funds, raising capital for alternative investments, alternative investment conference, alternative investment managers

13F Analysis Pequot Capital Management

Pequot Capital Management

Below please find a 13F analysis report for Pequot Capital Management for Q1 2009. 13F analyses are reports that fund managers with over $100M are required to submit to the SEC, they are publicly available and these reports provide us with some insights on what some hedge fund managers have been investing in.

Pequot Capital Management is a U.S. registered investment adviser founded in 1998 by Arthur J. Samberg, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, to manage the Pequot Family of Funds, which began trading in 1986. The firm invests utilizing multiple strategies across the capital structure. The firm has over 270 employees, with offices in Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts, California and London.

As of the most recent 13F filing completed by Pequot Capital Management their holdings included:

• (ACGL) Arch Capital Group
• (AIPC) American Italian Pasta Co
• (AKRX) Akorn
• (ALXN) Alexion Pharmaceuticals
• (GLD) SPDR Gold Trust
• (CFL) Brinks Home Securities Holdings
• (JACK) Jack In the Box
• (MCD) McDonalds
• (MMC) Marsh & McLennan companies
• (ONXX) Onyx Pharmaceuticals
• (PTP) Platinum Underwriters Holdings Ltd
• (QCOM) Qualcomm
• (RE) Everest RE Group Ltd
• (RNR) Renaissancere Holdings Ltd
• (WMTE) Walmart Stores

Using the TickerSpy portfolio analysis tool the graph to the left was created showing the approximate Pequot Capital Management‘s equity performance for over the previous six months. According to this analysis Pequot Capital Management‘s equity picks have been underperforming against the S & P 500 recently.

The top 5 highest performing equities which Paulson & Company held as of this 13F filing include (CFL), (MCD), (QCOM), (ALXN) and (JACK)

According to AlpaClone data on Pequot Capital Management 38% of their equity portfolio is invested within the financial sector and 30% in service sector. The total equity value of Pequot Capital Management is 950M+, their total number of reported holdings is 196, and over 47.8% of the market value of this portfolio is represented within the top 10 holdings.

For more information on Pequot Capital Management please see the HedgeFundBlogger.com Hedge Fund Tracker Profile on Pequot Capital Managment by clicking here .

Related to: Pequot Capital Management

Tags:13F analysis Pequot Capital Management, Pequot Capital Management's holdings, Pequot Capital Management fund, Pequot Capital Management13F filing, 13F, hedge fund, hedge funds, alternative investments

Family Office Capital Raising Advice

I often get asked how a fund should effectively work with a family office to slowly grow a relationship and be considered for an allocation. Many funds are interested in raising capital from family office wealth management firms because just a hand full of successful relationships may significantly raise the total assets under management for the firm.

Family Office Definition: A family office is a wealth and financial management firm setup to protect and grow the assets of single wealth family or group of families and wealthy individuals. Typical multi-family office clients have $30M or more in assets each, while many single family offices manage well over $250M in assets. The services provided by many family offices includes tax preparation and planning, wealth transfers, portfolio management, budgeting, real estate management, and insurance services. Many family offices exist because they offer a full spectrum of services which ensure that the client's total financial picture is taken into consideration before decisions are made.

Tips on how to work with family offices:

Many family offices are called daily by asset managers looking to build relationships, try to be local, different, more professional or more organized while meeting or working with family offices.
Focus on providing details on your team, competitive advantage and risk management process, a 7+ year track record or better will set you apart from many.
Similar to many other types of investors, Capital preservation and consistency usually will take precedence over volatile high returns.
High performance returns alone does not gain you any ground with a family office, in fact too high of returns may simply appear as risky and typically the most inexperienced fund mangaers concentrate their relationship development efforts on touting their high performance returns.
There are over 2,000 family offices in the United States alone, if you have gained some traction within this space it would be wise to allocate 30% of your time to this distribution channel and assign someone to help grow assets within this space. There are so many family offices to grow relationships with that anything less than a concerted effort using a dedicated professional and database of family offices may not be worth it.
Communicate through multiple channels. Sometimes sending a folder on your company, a well thought out but very concise email and then a phone call can be most effective while building a new relationship. Using these other marketing tools instead of just simply blasting out emails or calling everyone can make for a more productive relationship.
Do not call a family office that you would like to work with on a daily basis, they are relatively small organizations and do not have the time to work with groups which do not provide them with the professional consideration and space to reply in time to incoming requests. While I raised capital from wealth management firms and family offices we would touch base and follow up with these firms every week and a half, this way we try to stay on top of their minds without bugging them too much.

For a database of family office contacts please see FamilyOfficesDatabase.com, for a free-to-access collection of articles on family offices please see FamilyOfficesGroup.com.

Related to Family Office Capital Raising Advice

Tags: Capital Raising, Raising Capital from Family Offices, family office family offices, wealth management, financial advisors, hedge fund, hedge funds, private equity, alternative investments

Hedge Funds vs. Mutual Funds

I provided a quote yesterday to Daleela Farina, an author over at BloggingStocks.com. Here is an excerpt from an article she just published on hedge funds and mutual funds:

Has your broker repeatedly sold you on the "safe" investment vehicle, the mutual fund? Investing in a wide variety of prominent companies, with solid, long-term track records, mutual funds have been an easy-to-understand and popular investment choice for decades.

Mutual funds are hugely diversified, holding large stakes in recognizable names such as Google (GOOG), Citigroup (C), Walmart (WMT), Starbucks (SBUX), General Electric (GE), Bank of America (BAC), and Fannie Mae (FNM).

A few years ago, doubting these dominant brands would have been considered foolish. This narrow-minded thinking is representative of our formerly uneducated and naive views on the market. But after last year's performance, mutual funds' investment model has now been proven obsolete. Like the dinosaurs. source

Related to Hedge Funds vs. Mutual Funds

Tags: mutual funds, mutual fund, equities, stocks, stock market, etfs, etf, hedge fund, hedge funds, hedge funds vs. mutual funds

Patrick Fauchier of Fauchier Partners

Analysis and discussion with Patrick Fauchier of Fauchier Partners Chairman and David Sun of Ernst & Young China Chairman. They talk about the effects of hedge funds in the market. This video is also on the recent uptick of performance by large hedge funds and whether this is a shot-term gain or the building of long-term durable strategies.

View over 100 videos on hedge funds within our Hedge Fund Video Library.

Related to Patrick Fauchier of Fauchier Partners

Tags: Patrick Fauchier of Fauchier Partners, Fauchier Hedge Fund, Hedge Fund, Hedge Funds, Alternative Investments, Fauchier, Patrick Fauchier, Hedge fund managers

13F Analysis Blue Ridge Capital

Blue Ridge Capital Management

Below please find a 13F analysis report for Blue Ridge Capital for Q1 2009. 13F analyses are reports that fund managers with over $100M are required to submit to the SEC, they are publicly available and these reports provide us with some insights on what some hedge fund managers have been investing in.

Blue Ridge Capital Management is a $3B+ hedge fund run by John A. Griffin. Griffin is similar to Steve Mandel at Lone Pine Capital and Lee Ainslie at Maverick Capital in that they all are 'Tiger Cubs' (a.k.a. pupils of Julian Robertson while at Tiger Management).

As of the most recent 13F filing completed by Blue Ridge Capital Management their holdings included:
• (AAPL) Apple
• (AMGN) Amgen
• (AMZN) Amazon.com
• (BRK.A) Berkshire Hathaway
• (CVA) Covanta Holding group
• (MA) Master card
• (MIL) Millipore Corp
• (MON) Monsanto Co
• (MSFT) Microsoft
• (NOV) National Oilwell Varco
• (TGT) Target Corporation
• (TMO) Thermo Fisher Scientific
• (V) Visa
• (VALE) Comphania Vale Do Rio Doce
• (VNO) Vornado Realty Trust

The top 5 highest performing equities which Blue Ridge Capital held as of this 13F filing include (AAPL), (VALE), (VNO), (CVA), and(AMZN).

According to AlphaClone data on Blue Ridge Capital Management 27% of their equity portfolio is invested within the technology sector. The total equity value of Blue Ridge Capital's portfolio is $4B+, their total number of reported holdings is 49, and over 52% of the market value of this portfolio is represented within the top 10 holdings.

For more information on Blue Ridge Capital Management please see the HedgeFundBlogger.com Hedge Fund Tracker Profile on Blue Ridge by clicking here.

Related to: Blue Ridge Capital Management

Tags:13F analysis Blue Ridge Capital,Blue Ridge capital's holdings, Blue Ridge capital fund, Blue Ridge13F filing, 13F, hedge fund, hedge funds, alternative investments

Disclaimer

The content of this blog is in no way a means of financial advice or a solicitation to sell any investment or product. This website is for informational purposes only and is not to be construed as a solicitation or an offer to buy or sell any securities or related financial instruments nor an endorsement of any particular investment advisor firm or individual.

No warranty or guarantee of any kind, expressed or implied, is given regarding the accuracy, reliability, veracity, or completeness of the information provided here or by following links from this or any other page within this site, and under no circumstances will the author or service provider be held responsible, or liable for errors, or omissions resulting in any loss or damage caused or alleged to be caused by information contained in the material presented on the site, including but not limited to direct, indirect, incidental, special or consequential damages caused by using the information.