Japan hedge funds returned almost 19 percent this year through July, more than double the 8 percent gain of the Eurekahedge Asian Hedge Fund Index in the first seven months.
Japan-focused hedge funds received $1.7 billion of net capital inflows in the second quarter, accounting for 56 percent of the money global investors added to Asian hedge funds in the three months, according to Chicago-based data provider Hedge Fund Research Inc. The inflows brought assets of Japan funds to $24.8 billion, the highest in five years.
Soros Fund Management, billionaire George Soros’s $24 billion family office, made almost $1 billion since November from bets that the yen would tumble, a person close to the New York-based company told Bloomberg in mid-February. Balyasny Asset Management LP, which manages $3.7 billion, hired Bruce Kirk as its first manager focused on Japan fundamental long- short strategy, Colin Lancaster, a Chicago-based senior managing director, said in an e-mail in July.
Yet multi-asset funds in Asia have often had a better record of raising money than making money, Douglas added. “Investors will look closely at the underlying investment proposition of the fund.”
Goldman Sachs traders founded some of the industry’s largest startups over the years. Former Goldman Sachs partner Eric Mindich’s Eton Park Capital Management LP began trading in New York in 2004 with $3.5 billion, with assets growing to $14 billion by 2007.
Morgan Sze, a former Asia and global head of Goldman Sachs’s principal strategies proprietary trading group, raised $1 billion for his own hedge fund that began trading in April 2011, the most by a new Asia-based startup since at least 2007. Assets of his Hong Kong-based Azentus Capital Management Ltd. hit $1.9 billion within three months.