A Boom in Starter Capital for Hedge Funds

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As the industry’s returns have been disappointing, big money investors need somewhere to park their big money — and handing development capital to emerging hedge funds has become a strategy of choice.

On Monday, Deutsche Bank announced a partnership with Financial Risk Management, a fund of funds with about two decades of experience, to create a platform for seed investments. Also on Monday, IMQubator, a seeding fund backed by the Dutch pension giant APG, announced a partnership with Hong Kong-based Synergy Fund Management, a fund of funds who will assist in the selection of Asian hedge fund managers for the seeder.

In the last year alone, firms like Blackstone and Goldman Sachs have raised billions of dollars to provide starter capital to hedge funds. Others that have raised money include veteran seeder Reservoir Capital Group and smaller players like NewAlpha Asset Management.

The frenzy is driven primarily by two things. First, it is tough to raise money for small managers. Some investors are still craving the safety of size after the 2008 financial crisis. On top of that, with a changing investor base, there is a question of scale. The typical hedge fund investor is no longer the nimble family office, which can allocate small amounts of capital to whatever hedge fund strikes their fancy. The big investors like pensions and endowments who now dominate the landscape require hedge funds large enough to accept rich initial investments (as high as hundreds of millions of dollars).

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A Boom in Starter Capital for Hedge Funds

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