Hedge Funds and CTAs

The third quarter of 2010 saw the launch of 260 new hedge funds—up from 201 launches in Q2, according to Hedge Fund Research.

Hedge fund liquidations fell to 168 in Q3 from 177 in the previous quarter. This brings the total number of liquidated funds in 2010 to 585, down 31.8% over the same period in 2009. HFR notes that this is the fifth consecutive quarter in which launches outnumbered liquidations.

Morgan Sze is still Goldman Sachs' top proprietary trader. But he has begun to prepare for life after Goldman in a very concrete way—Sze is actively raising money for the hedge fund he and other veterans of Goldman's Asia prop. desk will launch when they leave the firm.

Six months after first crying foul over Lehman Brothers Holdings’ bankruptcy plan, 10 creditors led by Paulson & Co. have offered a roadmap of their own.

Icahn Enterprises helped sink the Blackstone Group’s bid to buy power company Dynegy Inc. Now, the hedge fund is moving to take the private equity giant’s place.

Money problems are holding up Harbinger Capital Management's $350 million deal for Old Mutual's U.S. life insurance unit.

Ray Dalio's Bridgewater Associates, the world’s largest hedge fund, has launched the Bridgewater Pure Alpha Major Markets II fund with $204 million raised from existing investors, according to regulatory filings.

FrontPoint Partners cut its entire 12-person team working on the funds at the beginning of November, according to published reports. The move came shortly after FrontPoint, which recently spun off from Morgan Stanley, acknowledged that Joseph Skowron, its lead healthcare manager, was the unidentified hedge fund manager named in the criminal complaint against a French doctor.

Last week, FrontPoint laid off more than two dozen non-investment staffers as it moves to cut costs in the face of the redemptions.

Paulson & Co. has raised more than US$100 million for a UCITS III-compliant retail version of its flagship hedge fund.

Moore Capital Management has lost one of its top—and most senior—traders with the retirement of Henry Bedford.

A pair of prominent commodities hedge funds have reaped rich returns in 2010.