Lets take a look at how the major hegde funds have performed through the year so far. Equity Long/Short and Event Driven hedge funds have mostly had brilliant returns through this year; a star example would be Dan Loeb’s Third Point Ultra, an event driven fund, which had gained 11.4 percent till March 6.
On the other hand two of Paulson’s funds detracted, Paulson Advantage and Advantage Plus posted a loss of 2.6 and 3.8 percent respectively at the end of Feb while Paulson Recovery Fund gained 5.2 percent in the same period.
Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square was down 0.15 percent in Feb but was up 3.5 percent YTD. Two of Ackman’s biggest allocations have not been doing very well lately. Ackman has already incurred a paper loss of $500 million in his investment in J.C. Penney Company, Inc. (NYSE:JCP). Same goes for Herbalife Ltd. (NYSE:HLF) where Ackman may not be losing yet but the stock has gained some of its lost value in the last weeks of February.
James Dinan who recently disclosed his short position in J.C. Penney Company, Inc. (NYSE:JCP)’s debt and also criticized Ackman on his persistent long stance on the company, gained 1.08 percent in the first week of March in his fund York Investment Ltd which is up 3.1 percent YTD.
In Equity L/S, Tiger Cub, Robert Karr’s Joho Capital (AUM $2.2 billion) has gained 6.6 percent through March 8 while Lee Ainsile’s Maverick Fund (AUM $2.6 billion) gained 1.6 percent in the same period. David Einhorn’s activism at Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) did not prove profitable despite of being technically successful; Greenlight Capital gained only 0.2 percent in Feb, bringing the YTD returns to 3.01 percent. Leon Cooperman’s Omega Overseas Partners was up 6.5 percent till Feb.
Odey European has yet to do any wrong. The top performer of 2012, the fund has already gained 11.4 percent in the first two months of 2013. Lansdowne European Equity gained 9.08 percent as of March 8; we also reported Lansdowne’s $240 million short bet in Air Liquide (PINK:AIQUY) (EPA:AI) last week.
The forex and rates focused Macro strategy saw mixed returns with most of the large funds posting over-the-top gains. Macro strategy has been mostly successful on short JPY trades against the USD. Some particularly huge gains have been coming from Rubicon Global which had gained a whopping 13.9 percent as of the first week of March. Tiger Cub Discovery Global Macro Fund gained 10.4 percent as of the end of February. MLM Macro Peak Partners had gained 10 percent as of the beginning of March and Caxton Global reached 5.9 percent in returns through the year as of March 12. Paul Tudor’s B.V.I Global Macro gained 7.9 percent till March 8.
On the losing end Conquest Macro had lost 13.7 percent as of March 12 whereas most of Brevan Howard’s macro funds managed to stay up but did not post any major returns.
In Distressed Credit strategy, Chenavari Toro Capital (AUM $382 million) was up 6.5 percent as of the end of February. Chenavari Toro Capital ranked among the Best Performing Hedge Fund List of 2012, ValueWalk conducted an exclusive interview with Chenavari’s CEO Loic Fery in February. In the same strategy, Paulson Credit Opportunities (AUM $4.28 billion) was up 4.26 percent. David Tepper’s Palomino Fund had gained 5.69 percent as of the end of Feb.
