WEST PALM BEACH, FL (HEDGECO.NET) – Sir George Mathewson, former chief executive of Royal Bank of Scotland, is to become chairman of hedge fund Toscafund Holdings. It is his second appointment in a week since retiring on 28 April after 19 years as chairman of RBS. He remains an adviser to RBS and is also a director of the Scottish Investment Trust.
During two decades with RBS, Sir George built a parochial lender that was vulnerable to takeover into a global banking powerhouse valued at more than £66bn. Following the transformational £22bn hostile acquisition of a flabby National Westminster Bank in 2000, RBS is now the eighth-biggest bank in the world.
Toscafund Holdings Limited is a global equity hedge fund and Sir George will be responsible for overseeing and guiding the growth of Toscafund, which manages $4bn (£2.1bn) for City institutions and the very rich. Toscafund runs a “long/ short†equity hedge fund, which invests in stocks that it expects to rise in value and also takes bets on other shares it thinks will fall.
In a statement, Toscafund’s chief executive and owner, the 45-year-old former banking analyst Martin Hughes, said he was “extremely pleased to have someone of Sir George’s calibre on the boardâ€Â, describing him as “an enormous assetâ€Â. Sir George’s pay for the part-time role was not disclosed.
Hedge funds, unlike traditional investment funds, are able to deploy a wider range of investment strategies across a broader range of markets and financial instruments in the search for better returns.
The number of hedge funds has soared from fewer than 500 managing less than $100bn in 1990 to more than 8,000 today with $1,500bn under management globally.
Alex Akesson
Contributing Writer
HedgeCo.Net
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