The brilliant hedge-fund manager may be an endangered species.
After a lousy 2011 for most hedge funds, this year isn’t turning out much better.
Some of the bold-face industry names are trailing the S&P 500’s total return of 13.5 percent through August — a return many on Main Street get from their mutual funds.
Hotshots like David Einhorn, Dan Loeb and Bill Ackman are some of this year’s laggards.
Einhorn’s Greenlight Capital gained 10.9 percent through Aug. 31, while Loeb’s Third Point rose 7.5 percent and Ackman’s Pershing Square was up 6.9 percent, according to investors.
Hedging, it turns out, has not helped them.
“Any hedging whatsoever has generally hurt this year, and long quality/short crap hasn’t worked due to [risk on-risk off],” said a prominent hedge fund investor, in a reference to investors’ fickleness.
The international arena has also been difficult for managers to navigate. Some of the most-storied macro funds, which invest in markets across the globe, continue to be flummoxed by the euro’s resilience, among other geopolitical quandaries.
Last year’s retirement of hedge fund icon Bruce Kovner hasn’t helped macro giant Caxton Associates, now under the direction of Andrew Law. Caxton Global fell 2.5 percent through Sept. 6.
Louis Bacon’s Moore Global is barely above break-even — up 0.8 percent through Aug. 23. The legendary Paul Tudor Jones did a little better; his flagship rose 3.8 percent through August.
There are some bright spots in hedge fund land, thanks in large part to Apple, which has long been a favored holding of the funds seeded by or spun out of Julian Robertson’s Tiger Management.
Chase Coleman’s Tiger Global, which he co-manages with Feroz Dewan, gained 21 percent through August, and the flagship of Lee Ainslee’s Maverick Capital, one of the original Tiger cubs, rose 20 percent.