While we are still in the early reporting cycle for May, we note that most Hedge Fund struggled to generate returns in May, with one exception, a marginal positive contribution from Risk Premia strategies. Equity Long/Short had flat performance, while Crypto Managers recorded a large negative month (which we have previously provided comments on).
The intra-month change in equity markets provided a slight giveback of profits for CTAs, and recovery for Equity L/S strategies. Market Neutral managers are continuing to provide good returns as a number of traditional equity factors are coming back to life. Event-Driven traders are continuing to struggle amongst liquid alternative options.
There seems to be a large number of technology focused hedge fund firms that have suffered badly in May. According to Bloomberg, Tiger is reporting a loss of 52% and has had to resort to the old trick of putting illiquid holdings into a side pocket. Much of the blame is being put on the Fed and the end of the easy money era that resulted in a mid-month sell-off for the Nasdaq. Ultimately Nasdaq ended May with a positive number. A strange month, where a lot of markets traded as if they were subject to forced liquidations.
In the meantime, we have updated our database, and with 1,500 funds reporting, there is ample room for digging into the database. For instance, find out which six crypto managers that weathered a truly disruptive month…
You must log in to post a comment.