For its September issue, Absolute Return is running a “hedge fund report card.” The magazine polled hundreds of investors, asking them to rate their respective funds based on factors that included alignment of interests, alpha generation, independent oversight, infrastructure, transparency and liquidity terms. The results put York Capital at number one, followed by Bridgewater Associates, Bain’s Brookside Capital, Adage Capital and Cayon Capital overall. Bringing up the rear were SAC Capital, TPG-Axon, QVT Financial, Citadel and Cerberus Capital in dead last. In addition to asking the investors to simply provide scores, AR also afforded them their opportunity to air their grievances. Let out what they’ve been holding in, etc. For instance, someone with Citadel apparently doesn’t think Ken Griffin treats his clients right, noting that KG “holds his investors somewhere between indifference and disdain.” Which doesn’t really seem that fair! Continue reading »
Festivus
Hedge Fund Investors Want Steve Cohen To Pull Back His Kimono, Think Ken Griffin Doesn’t Care About Them
By Bess Levin
As previously mentioned, in tough times like these, not in lieu of but perhaps in conjuntion with professional counseling, we invite you to lay down on the Dealbreaker couch and let it all out. If anyone else has a grievance they’d like to work through and/or more widely disseminate, send it our way. From the mailbag:
Much like BofA, the legacy Barclays folks got screwed this bonus season. Barcap bonus numbers were ~50% of what the Lehman people got, with 50% of that lower number deferred over the next two years, making the Barcap folks all feel like second class citizens.
Now what you may not be aware of, is that Barcap also switched over to the Lehman analyst system (3 years and you’re out if you don’t get an associate offer). By some magical coincidence (AKA 10-person analyst promotion board composed 80% ex-Lehmanites), hardly any of the third year Barcap analysts got promotion offers. They are being told that if they did not get a promotion offer, they will be done in June and will not be receiving any of the deferred portion of their comp. I don’t know why you would put a number down on paper, just to slide it across a table to tell the person that this is what they will NOT be receiving, but that’s exactly what they did.
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