AllAboutAlpha.com was broadcasting from the “Left Coast” of the United States last week.  We met with purveyor of gloom, boom & doom Marc Faber at a Los Angeles CAIA event, got stuck in the San Francisco Giants World Series victory parade,  went to Sacramento along with California’s new “Governator,” Jerry Brown (okay, not that new, [...]

Like the ubiquitous volcanic ash cloud story, the hedge fund fee story kind of floats around for a while, then reemerges without warning to steal the headlines.

Today, we revisit a few notable news items that raised some interesting questions over the past week or two.

Here's a selection of news from the cutting room floor.

All the news that's fit to eat this Thanksgiving.

Today, we bring you the final installment of our “Summer of 1,000 Posts” (more…) This week we’ll be looking at alternative investments in the mainstream by pulling from our archives of posts on media coverage of hedge funds and hedge fund investing for retail investors.  Enjoy. Report shows that some wounds recently suffered by wealth managers may [...]

Today, we bring you another installment of our “Summer of 1,000 posts” (more…) This week’s sampling from our archives covers the topic of Institutional Investing… Shipping as an alternative investment Thought shipping was just a global growth play?  Apparently, it depends on how you measure it. BCG Forecast: Institutions to seek “innovative products” such as HF and PE A new [...]

Today, we bring you another installment of our “Summer of 1,000 Posts” (more…) This week’s sampling from our archives covers the topic of Hedge Fund Regulation… Hedge Fund Standards Board issues rules on how to exit crowded theatres when someone yells “Fire!” Here’s a set of safety instructions every movie usher needs to have. “Libertarian Paternalism”: A happy medium [...]

Today, we bring you another installment of our “Summer of 1,000 posts” (more…) This week we’ll be looking back through our archives to cull posts on the topic of CAPM/Alpha Theory… How Hollywood, lotteries and mutual funds show that all risk is relative Since the birth of the CAPM, empirical evidence has been uncooperative – showing that high [...]

We had our official archivist pour over the first 1,000 posts to be published at AllAboutAlpha.com in order to bring you a selection of posts on the topic of Portable Alpha and Alpha/Beta Separation.

E.M.H. R.I.P. W.T.F? In an ironic twist, the Economist suggests that financial engineering (and by extension the hedge funds built with its outputs) are built on the shoulders of the efficient market hypothesis.  Yet the much ballyhooed demise of the EMH should, in theory, pave the way for skill-based, alpha-centric returns.  In fact, the newspaper [...]

We had our official archivist pour over the first 1,000 posts to be published at AllAboutAlpha.com in order to bring you a selection of posts on the topic of Hedge Fund Industry Trends.

We’re in Chicago this week for the Managed Funds Association’s Forum 2009.  More on that later.  But for now, here is a compilation of some stories that caught our eye last week… Gates designed to keep investors out, not in It was bound to happen.  Reuters reports that: “A small number of top hedge funds are once more [...]

All the news that's fit to blog about.

AllAboutAlpha.com  rolled into the Chicago earlier today.  So if you see our tour bus rolling around the Windy City with the giant alpha symbol on the side, please wave and say hello. It’s tough to drive a bus and read hedge fund research at the same time though (until leading investment journals launch a “books-on-tape” service).  [...]

What do hedge funds have to do with double black diamond ski runs? Read and find out.

In Echoes Of Madoff, Ponzi Cases Proliferate: Apparently, we weren’t the only ones struck by the sudden abundance of alleged Ponzi schemes (see Ponzipalooza).  The WSJ notes the same in this story.  The question remains, however: Just because you cash out at a fictitious NAV, is it a true Ponzi scheme?  (Call us “Ponzi purists” [...]

Just when the fate of the hedge fund industry seemed fixed, several news items remind us that all bets are still off.

End of the Hedge Fund? Unlikely, according to Washington Post columnist Sebastian Mallaby who writes, “Even if you define Madoff’s investment outfit as a hedge fund, which for various reasons is debatable, there’s nothing in this saga that supports clamping down on the industry.” Hedge funds return to roots as alpha claim refuted: This prediction of [...]

You may have noticed that our fancy-schmancy new website displays all of our discarded news clippings and displays them on right behind this panel in our “news clippings” section (check it out right now if you like).  However, if you don’t have the time or inclination to click on every link you see in that section, [...]

Despite injuries sustained over the past year, it seems that hedge funds can count on the support of institutions and rich guys.

You have to see it to believe it.

Giants launched with record $19.5 bln in first half: Industry concentration means that its feast and famine at the same time in the hedge fund industry. Swedish funds hope rules to change soon: The Swedish public pension scheme lobbies its government to allow more access to alternative investments.  As P&I observes, “Alternatives managers — particularly global [...]

Hedge Funds Hire From Wall Street as Jobs Disappear, Pay Falls: Bloomberg reports that hedge fund recruiters may be the biggest beneficiaries of the carnage on Wall Street. Asia to Create Thousands of Hedge Fund Jobs, Pinnacle Says: And it appears that some of those hedge fund recruiters are likely to be located in Asia. First Half [...]

Last week was uncommonly busy in the world of asset management news. Here's some interesting stuff you might have missed...

New York Life 130/30 Webcast (video): New York Life Investment Management 130/30 video is now online.  Enjoy on your 60″ plasma screen with some popcorn. Institutional Investment Managers Predicted to Increase Hedge Fund Allocations by 25 to 50 Percent Over the Next Two Years: Wharton prof. says “You’d expect a certain proportion of failures — including some spectacular [...]

It always confused me how airline business lounges could charge extra for WiFi access.  After charging an arm and a leg for lie-flat seats and 290 hours of TV reruns, airlines still make you crack open the AllAboutAlpha.com corporate credit card just to access the web.  Well, the friendly folks at our local Star Alliance lounge have finally come [...]

Inalytics launches new service to analyse 130/30 funds: Thomson reports that “The firm specialises in quantitative forensic analysis to identify 130/30 managers that can add value from skill by verifying that their short positions actually generate returns.” Nervous alternatives managers could be leaving alpha on the table: P&I reports from ”AlphaMax” in Madrid that “Fees became a [...]

Like countless new technologies before it, portable alpha has disrupted the otherwise steady evolution of things. But don't take it from us...

In recognition of our legions of loyal readers in Budapest, Hungary, we are broadcasting live from the “Pearl of the Danube” today.  (Actually, no – we don’t quite have “legions” of Hungarian readers.  But yes, today’s newsreel was produced on the banks of the Danube where Alpha Male was sharing his two cents on alpha-centric investing [...]

There has been a flurry of news on the hedge fund regulation front over the past week. Here's a quick tour of all the excitement in the US and Europe.

“Hedge funds come unstuck on truth-twisting”: Aussie newspaper The Age provides a great example of why AIMA felt compelled to put its foot down on anti-hedge fund hype yesterday.  The article covers a recent academic study and starts with “Has the hedge-fund industry been built on a series of lies?” and continues on to proclaim, “Now it [...]

Below is out (shortened) weekly round-up of stories in which you might be interested, but which didn’t graduate to full stories on AllAboutAlpha.com.  As usual, all these stories are listed in the scrolling news ticker you see at the top of your screen. Lawrence Cohen, a NY lawyer, dives deeper into the legal issues surrounding the Bulldog [...]

Here is a sample of the news stories we didn’t get a chance to explore in detail this week.  As usual, all of them can be found on the Alpha-ticker above or in the news items section of AllAboutAlpha.com (free registration may be required for a few of these). Morgan Stanley says Alpha/Beta Separation “the way [...]

We come across a lot of interesting news items each week.  In some cases, we see enough items on a particular theme write a posting on their common threads – what they say about the hedge fund industry, how they illustrate some alpha-centric investment strategy, or why they spell trouble (or success) for alternative investing. Whatever [...]