Alternative Investment

News Alternative strategies for a democratic U.S. Congress

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Strategy The EM FX carry trade is back

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Strategy Five reasons why special situations outlook is brightening

Special Situations strategies have been under pressure in 2020, both on their event and credit arbitrage books. Due to their long structural market beta, managers have underperformed early this year. They have retraced most but not all they have (...)

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Strategy Dollar depreciation helps CTAS

Since the U.S. presidential election on November 3 th, the USD has started a descent that may have legs under the new administration. The easing of trade tensions and an accommodative policy mix could put additional pressure on the DXY, which was down -1.7% since the (...)

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Strategy Most L/S Equity emerge unscathed from factor rotations

Several hedge fund strategies have momentum biases, in particular L/S Equity, and CTAs. Considering the fact that this rotation took place in a bullish environment, most hedge fund strategies ended the week in positive (...)

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Strategy Hedge fund positioning ahead of U.S. Elections

If past elections provide any guidance, prospects for a Trump reelection look slim. History suggests that a second term reelection almost always requires strong growth. In most past election campaigns, polls did not materially shift after (...)

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Strategy Our thoughts on the rally in momentum stocks

Momentum is a strategy which buys stocks trending higher and sells stocks on a downtrend within an index. It is systematic and has no considerations for earnings, valuation, or other fundamental metrics such as (...)

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Opinion Weaker Alpha potential in EM Debt after the rally…temporarily

The market crash that began in March sent the spread of EM debt (for the hard currency aggregate) to nearly 700 bps. It is now only 30 bps away from the pre-crisis level. This spread tightening reflects the ongoing economic recovery EM countries. Trends in Covid-19 are (...)

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News What are activists buying after the storm?

The Special Situations strategy went through a roller coaster since February. Typically, due to their long structural market beta, managers tend to underperform in risk-off episodes. However, as they also tend to look beyond short-term volatility, they usually rebound (...)

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News Mixed outlook for L/S Equity Neutral and Short-Selling

Lyxor’s L/S Equity Neutral peer group was down -2.8% year-to-date, hurt by extreme trading conditions and the constituents’ average market beta of 20%. The environment has been challenging for the strategy amid extreme stock volatility and unsettling heavy systematic trading (...)

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Strategy CTAs as shock absorbers

In the space of alternative strategies, Global Macro and Event-Driven strategies rebounded the most since March 23rd. Both Merger Arbitrage and Special Situations sub strategies benefitted as M&A deal spreads tightened significantly since (...)

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Note ESMA report values EU Alternative Investment Funds at €5.8 trillion

The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) today published its second statistical report on European Union (EU) Alternative Investment Funds (AIF). The study found that the EU AIF sector in 2018, as measured by Net Asset Value (NAV), amounted to €5.8tn or nearly 40% (...)

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Strategy Small, Medium, Large HF: How to choose?

Should alternative portfolios favor smaller, medium, or larger hedge funds? The choice might not be as obvious as before and may be more dependent on the stage of the business cycle. For many years, small hedge funds have steadily outperformed their large peers, sometimes by (...)

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Strategy Trend reversals briefly halted the CTA rise

Despite the escalation of trade tensions during the third quarter, economic activity has remained quite resilient. Macro data releases even managed to beat expectations in the U.S. and in Japan, leading to a sudden rise in bond yields over the course of (...)

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Strategy Falling Geopolitical Premium to fuel Global Macro Strategies

Progress in trade talks between the U.S. and China and in Brexit negotiations knocked down safe assets last week. Bond yields rose in most developed countries and gold prices fell, as the stance on both thorny issues reversed and turned (...)

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Note Are markets becoming more unstable?

Readers of financial news may believe that ‘market corrections’, or ‘shocks’, or ‘five-sigma events’ are more common than they used to be. Winton Capital Management look at the historical data for a number of financial markets and find that there is no evidence for increasing (...)

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Interview Bruno Crastes : « Our models are still based on an enhanced version of the Black-Litterman model »

Former star managers of Amundi, Bruno Castres and Vincent Chailley have created H2O Asset Management, a London-based alternative management company. In an interview with Next-Finance, Bruno Castres unveils the firm’s objectives and (...)

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Regulation ESMA rules aim to curb excessive risk taking by alternative fund managers

The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) has published final Guidelines on remuneration of alternative investment fund managers (AIFMs). The rules will apply to managers of alternative investment funds (AIFs) including hedge funds, private equity funds and real (...)

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Opinion Are L/S Equity managers concerned by the covid resurgence?

Managers in the U.S. and Europe are continuing to reduce both their net and gross exposures, now converging near their long-term lows. They are selectively selling or shorting stocks that are the most exposed to tighter restrictions, preferring value stocks instead (to (...)

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Regulation Amundi Alternative Investments obtains AIFM authorisation

Amundi Alternative Investments SAS (Amundi AI), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Amundi, has obtained AIFM authorisation from the French securities regulator (Autorité des Marchés Financiers) for all of its investment solutions. The AIFM directive, transposed by the EU member (...)

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Strategy L/S Equity strategies bear the brunt of the turmoil

L/S Equity and Event-Driven strategies underperformed due to their elevated market beta. L/S Equity strategies also suffered due to the rotation in risk factors which saw growth/ momentum stocks underperforming value and low beta (...)

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Interview Nicolas Duban & Jérôme Coirier : « This year, among the 70 reviewed projects, a significant number is related to quantitative asset management companies »

According to Nicolas Duban and Jérôme Coirier, Chairman and CEO of NEXT-AM, subsidiary of La Française AM, managing minority interests of the Group, associated with investment partners, some projects could be in the pipeline, in the near (...)

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News NewAlpha Asset Management announces the initial closing of its fourth hedge fund seeding vehicle

NewAlpha 4 Genesis has completed its first closing of $150 million raised from French and Swiss institutional investors.

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Innovation Nordea Asset Management launches its first fund with Madrague Capital Partners

Nordea Asset Management announces the launch on 06 December 2018, the Nordea 1 – European Long/Short Equity Fund (‘the Fund”). The Fund is a liquid alternative strategy designed for investors searching for yields higher than traditional fixed income products, while at the same (...)

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News The year 2016 gets off to a great start for CTAs

Year to date, most alternative strategy performance are negative. Despite this challenging environment, CTAs have recorded an excellent start since the beginning of the year. According to Credit Suisse, CTAs posted a gain of 7.38% in late February 2016, the strongest (...)

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News The market for catastrophe bonds (« Cat bonds ») remains dynamic!

Over the 12 months, the market for Cat bonds - bonds issued by securitization structure to refinance insurance risks related to natural disaster - remains dynamic, both in terms of volume and performance...

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News A Taste of Summer for Hedge Funds

The winning streak for hedge funds continued last week with all strategies, besides CTAs, benefitting from the stabilization of market conditions. The Lyxor Hedge Fund Index was up 0.5%, bringing the month to date performance to a solid (...)

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Note Hedge funds: The CTAs drift

Since mid-2011, CTAs cumulative loss is between -10.6% (HFRI macro systematic index) and -16.8% (Credit Suisse Managed Futures Index). For the first quarter of this year, CTAs show a drawdown of about 3% which is expected to increase in April (-0.66% for HFRX CTA index) (...)

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News Systematic strategies are back

For the second month in a row, CTAs outperformed hedge fund strategies in April. According to the Lyxor CTA peer group, the strategy was up +1.6% in April, which brings the year-to-date performance close to +5%.

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Strategy Our take on opposite Macro/CTA views on bonds

Systematic Global Macro and CTAs are often associated because many strategies are multi-asset, global, and have a top down investment process. Benchmark indices tend to pool them together.

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