Reuters – European institutional investors have long sung the praises of hedge funds, but have been slow to put money into these loosely regulated portfolios, according to a study released onWednesday.<\/p>\n
European investors have been talking hedge funds up since 2000, when the stock investments amassed losses while hedge funds delivered strong gains for several years.<\/p>\n
But consultants at Greenwich Associates found that many Europeans may not have acted on their glowing reviews. Indeed their most recent study shows only a small portion of the roughly $1.3 trillion invested in the world’s hedge funds comes from European institutions.<\/p>\n
“The enthusiasm is there,” said Tobias Miarka, a Greenwich consultant who worked on the study. “But the actual increase in allocations is not as high as one might expect.”<\/p>\n
In Germany, insurers and pension funds have invested only 2 percent, or roughly 20 billion euros, of their total portfolio with hedge funds and private equity funds, consultants found.<\/p>\n