The Bulletin – Hedge fund managers on average lost 18.7 percent of their clients’ money in 2008, for the worst performance since at least 1990, according to Hedge Fund Research Inc. Combine the losses with investor redemptions, and total hedge fund assets have been cut almost in half. TrimTabs Investment Research and Barclay Hedge Ltd. estimated funds held $1.1 trillion at the end of the year, down from $1.9 trillion a year earlier.
One rare bright spot: the resilience of global macro fund managers, who wager on currencies, equities, interest rates and commodities based on their fundamental analysis of world economic trends.