Billionaire investor Barry Rosenstein's Jana Partners hedge fund ended 2015 with a 5.4 percent loss, marking its first down year since 2011 and only the third time it has lost money for the full year.
The drop came even after the fund finished December with a 1.0 percent gain, according to an investor update seen by Reuters. The monthly increase was not enough to wipe away several months of losses during the middle of the year.
Jana Partners, which has been in business since 2001, last had a down year in 2011, when the fund dipped 2.1 percent. Before that it lost 23.6 percent in 2008, during the financial crisis when many hedge funds lost money.
Rosenstein is among the first hedge fund managers to report final 2015 tallies to investors and is expected to have plenty of company as other firms also lost money last year.
William Ackman's Pershing Square Capital Management lost 19.7 percent through Dec. 29 while Cantab Capital Partners Quantitative Fund was off 6.24 percent through Dec. 18 and Andrew Redleaf's Whitebox multistrategy fund was down 2.45 percent through Dec. 18. Halfway through December, Jason Mudrick's Distressed Opportunity fund was down 22.5 percent for the year.
Early indications suggested hedge funds, on average, lost 3.49 percent, according to Hedge Fund Research, compared with the Standard & Poor's 500, which ended the year with a 1.4 percent gain.
The Jana fund was hurt by bets on semiconductor company Qualcomm <QCOM.O>, which tumbled 30 percent in 2015, and car rental group Hertz Global <HTZ.N> which dropped 43 percent last year.
The Jana Nirvana fund, which has a more aggressive investment strategy, lost 7.9 percent last year after gaining 1.4 percent in December, according to the investor update. It was off 2.5 percent in 2011 and lost 24.3 percent in 2008.