It’s been over a week since Muddy Waters made allegations about the accounts of Olam. Since then Olam has come out swinging, refuting the allegations and suing.
Yesterday evening, the report was made available. Most of the issues have been flagged by analysts earlier. But there are issues about the restatements of accounts that don’t affect profits and capex that need addressing by Olam.
Remember Temasek owns 16% of Olam. So it too will be studying the report.
Before they discovered hedge funds, pension funds and endowments typically held portfolios with 60 percent in equities and 40 percent in bonds. Many would be better off if they had stuck with the old formula.
Hedge funds have trailed both the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index and a Vanguard index fund with the same 60/40 mix over the past five years, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The balanced fund beat the main Bloomberg hedge-fund index in six of the last seven calendar years, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-07-11/hedge-funds-trail-vanguard-as-elliott-returns-atypical
Still as Bloomberg News reports: “GLG Partners, a unit of the world’s largest publicly traded hedge fund manager, formed a long-short equities team in Asia co-headed by a former fund manager at Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund, seeking opportunities in the region’s stock market.” http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-07-15/glg-forms-asia-equities-team-co-headed-by-former-gic-manager.html
And a bull on US retailers.
And he has outperformed his peers!
Smaller Asian hedgies are closing (US$120m is “peanuts”). http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/04/lehman-hedgefund-closure-idUSL3E8H420G20120604
Not gd news for S’pore’s financial centre aspirations. It once (pre 2007 crisis) had lax rules to get these guys in, hoping they would grow.
But hope springs eternal.
Coming our way? Many of funds in Switzerland had juz relocated from London. But now the Swiss government is considering rules that would turn a relatively “light-touch” regulatory environment into “one of the most exacting jurisdictions in the world to run a hedge fund,” the Financial Times reported about two months ago.
Funny that our constructive nation-building media don’t report this news. Been too busy sliming WP, to report on a possible positive development.
