Bishop declined to comment on performance or on Soros’s views.
Warning Sign
China’s March credit-growth figures should be viewed as a warning sign, Soros said at an Asia Society event in New York on April 20. The broadest measure of new credit in the nation was 2.34 trillion yuan ($360 billion) last month, far exceeding the median forecast of 1.4 trillion yuan in a Bloomberg survey.
Soros, a former hedge fund manager who built a $24 billion fortune, in January called a hard landing in China “practically unavoidable.” Soros returned outside capital in 2011 and his firm now manages his own wealth. Hedge fund managers including Crispin Odey at London-based Odey Asset Management and Kyle Bass at Hayman Capital Management in Dallas have been wagering on a slowdown in China. Bass is said to be starting a fund to focus on China-related investments.
Bishop isn’t the only U.S. hedge fund manager who’s bullish on China. In March, Jordi Visser, head of investments at $1.4 billion Weiss Multi-Strategy Advisors, said China’s Shenzhen Composite Index will beat most global peers by the end of this year.
Bishop spent at least a decade focusing on commodities and other cyclical stocks at hedge funds Maverick Capital, Kingdon Capital and Julian Robertson’s Tiger Management.
Impala said in a March 31 investor memo obtained by Bloomberg that energy prices have bottomed, and that improving U.S. demographic and consumer trends, loosening mortgage availability and tight supply are creating an environment in which the homebuilding cycle will accelerate.