A move to restructure hedge fund fees is spreading in Texas.
The University of Texas Investment Management Co. is trying to change how its hedge fund managers are paid using a model known as 1-or-30 which charges a 1 percent management fee or 30 percent of performance -- whichever is higher. The plan, begun in recent months, follows a similar effort started last year by the Teacher Retirement System of Texas.
Britt Harris, the former chief investment officer at Texas Teachers who took over as head of Utimco in August, is leading the effort he calls “project fair and just.” The plan is to guarantee that institutional investors receive at least 70 percent of the gains from hedge funds even when returns lag behind the broader market, as they have for many funds for much of the past decade, Harris said.
Hedge funds typically charge 2 percent of assets in management fees and 20 percent of profit. That model has been under scrutiny as funds have struggled to match market benchmarks.
Funds overall gained 5.2 percent this year through November, trailing the 20 percent return for the S&P 500, according to data from Hedge Fund Research Inc.
Utimco, which oversees $29 billion of endowments for the University of Texas and Texas A&M University, said six funds overseeing $2.5 billion of its assets will reset how they charge for management and performance. The new structure means they could get paid as little as 1 percent on assets if they don’t meet a performance target. Six other funds have been approached and “we expect most of them to agree as well,” Harris said in an email.
“They’re listening to us,” he said of the fund managers at a Nov. 29 meeting of Utimco’s board of directors.
Utimco has at least $4.6 billion of hedge fund investments, including managers such as Baupost Group and Bridgewater Associates, according to reports from the nonprofit. It declined to say which of the 30 funds it invests with are renegotiating fees. The funds contacted declined to comment.
Harris was Bridgewater’s chief executive officer for less than a year before joining Texas Teachers in 2006.
Texas Teachers, with $140 billion in assets, has 43 fund investments with 38 managers, a spokeswoman said. About 70 percent of its hedge fund assets have a fee structure in line with Texas Teachers’ philosophy, she said. Carlson Capital was the first fund to agree to renegotiated terms with Texas Teachers, the pension fund said. A spokesman for Dallas-based Carlson declined to comment.