Baltimore Sun – A Securities and Exchange Commission proposal to sharply limit the number of Americans who can invest in hedge funds has triggered a public backlash – and the latest controversy over the booming private investment pools.<\/p>\n
The agency has received hundreds of e-mail messages and letters since December, when it proposed raising the financial bar for hedge fund eligibility for the first time since 1982.<\/p>\n
Most of those writing have advised the SEC to back off. Some comments have an angry tone, unusual for matters of securities regulation.<\/p>\n
“This has got to be unconstitutional, if not communistic,” wrote M. Joan Conrad, a Naples, Fla., resident who says she has had money in hedge funds for the past decade.<\/p>\n
The commission proposed limiting participation in the largely secretive and unregulated investment vehicles to investors who have a minimum of $2.5 million in investable assets, excluding the value of their primary residence.<\/p>\n
Currently, investors must have a minimum of $1 million in net worth, including real estate, or earn at least $200,000 a year.<\/p>\n