Tags: Galleon, Hedge funds, Insider Trading, Liquidations / implosions, Raj Rajaratnam, SAC Capital
Tags: Fees, Hamptons, John Meriwether, liquidations, Liquidations / implosions, Real Estate, TPG
Another John Meriwether fund is said to be shutting down after heavy losses: Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: Hedge funds, John Meriwether, Liquidations / implosions, LTCM, Toe Tags
One of the first funds to actually shut down over the disastrous hedge trade between Volkswagen and Porsche shares — that resulted in the mother of all short squeezes in Volkswagen stock — has emerged. The $240 million Trident European Fund, run by $3.5 billion JO Hambro, is liquidating after suffering a 25% loss in October. The fund, managed by Basil Postan, was down 39% for the year and had thrown off an average 8.4% annual return since opening 10 years ago.
Here's the statement that John Devaney published via PRNewswire. No , he wasn't booed off the stage, he says. The account was "totally fabricated".
Tags: Credit Crunch, Hedge funds, John Devaney, Liquidations / implosions
Ouch: John Devaney, the former billionaire baller and skipper of the imploded and liquidated Horizon Funds (and yacht "Positive Carry") didn't get such a great reception last Monday when he spoke at an annual conference for asset backed securities held in Miami. According to the NY Post, he was booed on stage during a "rant on why the markets were wrong and he was right". Later that evening he held an invitation only party on his mom's yacht (since his "Positive Carry" had been sold)…
Tags: Credit Crunch, Hedge funds, John Devaney, Liquidations / implosions, Toe Tags
Highland Capital announced yesterday that it was liquidating 2 credit hedge funds — its $1.5 billion Crusader Fund and the $500 million Credit Strategies Fund. Highland wrote to its investors: "Unprecedented market volatility and disruption to the financial system continue to pose huge challenges, with conditions having deteriorated significantly over the past 60 days and in particular over the last two weeks.". According to Reuters:
Highland Capital, which still manages three hedge funds as well as other strategies, told investors that its managers hope to sell 40 percent of the Crusader portfolio over the next 12 months. The remainder will be paid in a period of up to four years, the partners wrote. The long time-frame illustrates just how difficult it is to exit positions now.
The smaller Credit Strategies Fund hopes to sell 20 percent of its portfolio over the next six months with another 20 percent sold off in the six months after that. Another 15 percent will be sold in the six months after that and the rest paid in a period of up to three years.
Highland investors began getting nervous as early as this summer when they demanded back millions of dollars after losses at the roughly $2 billion Crusader fund swelled to about 15 percent for the year. A schedule for repayments was worked out at that point. In its heyday, Crusader managed roughly $3 billion.
Out of curiosity, we took a look at their last 13F filing to see what they owned. If they were still in many of the same stocks — and the 13F was as of 6/30, so there could have been significant changes — they're in a world of hurt. Here are the charts for the 6/30/08 13F stocks, as of yesterday's close. Oogly. :
Tags: 13F Charts, Credit Crunch, Hedge funds, Highland Capital, Liquidations / implosions
Tags: Bankruptcy, Dick Fuld, Drexel, Lehman Brothers, Liquidations / implosions
Dwight Anderson’s largest hedge fund — the Ospraie Fund, with $2.8 billion in assets at the beginning of August — is closing its doors after suffering massive commodities related losses during the course of 2008. Year to date the fund was down 38.6% with most of the losses coming since July. The fund has been selling assets over the last three weeks and there’s been speculation that those sales have been a possible contributor to the recent fall in commoditiy prices.
The big fund’s demise could complicate fund raising efforts for beleagered Lehman Brothers. The firm owns 20% of the closing hedge fund’s manager, Ospraie Management.
Three remaining Ospraie funds manage over $4 billion in assets, but that’s down from $9 billion in March. According to Bloomberg:
The Ospraie Fund lost 26.7 percent in
August, after a “substantial sell-off in a number of our energy, mining and
resource equity holdings,” Anderson, 41, wrote in the letter today.“I am extremely disappointed with this result and the fund’s sudden reversal in
performance,” he said. “After nine years of striving to be a good steward of
your capital, I am very sorry for this outcome.”
Tags: Commodities, Hedge funds, Liquidations / implosions, Toe Tags
Another one bites the dust: Distressed debt hedge fund, Turnberry Capital, run
by Jeff Dobbs, is liquidating after suffering redemption from many of its
investors. As of last year the fund ran roughly $800 million, according to
Reuters. Around 70% of the firm’s credit derivatives book has already been
unwound.
Another Carlyle Group fund has run aground and is liquidating. It’s multi-strategy Blue Wave fund, which has seen assets drop from $900 million when the fund opened its doors in 1997 to around $600 is going the orderly liquidation route:
Tags: Carlyle, Credit Crunch, Hedge funds, Liquidations / implosions
Former Sowood Capital leader Jeffrey Larson is trying to make like a phoenix and raise cash for a new fund. If you recall, Sowood was one of the spectacularly imploded funds from last year, losing around $1.5 billion, or half of the fund’s value. They apologized profusely in a letter to investors (when most other firms experiencing big losses didn’t show quite as much remorse.) Last April the Boston Globe reported that Larson would try to raise a new fund. Now Larson is said to be beating the bushes for cash. He’s said to be offering some concessions in his terms as an inducement for a second chance. He’s described by Reuters as so far having only mixed results.
Billion Dollar Wall Street Baller no more?: John Devaney, the flamboyant hedge fund manager and head of United Capital Markets Holdings who made massive wrong way sub-prime bets, was forced to liquidate his Horizon funds. And unfortunately, investors will be getting bupkus. Yep. A total zero.
Early this year, Devaney spoke at a conference where he said that it was time to start moving back into the sub-prime market. To keep his sinking empire afloat, he had been selling assets — including his prized yacht "Positive Carry", helicopters, a plane and a Renoir.
According to Bloomberg:
The Horizon group of funds run by Devaney’s
United Capital Markets Holdings Inc. couldn’t meet a margin call from Deutsche
Bank AG at the end of June, according to a letter to clients today obtained by
Bloomberg News. Deutsche Bank then seized and auctioned off the collateral.
Tags: Credit Crunch, Hedge funds, John Devaney, Liquidations / implosions, Toe Tags
Jeffrey Larson, former head of one of last year’s big hedge fund implosions — Sowood Capital — is looking for a second act. After losing $1.6 billion — over half of his failed firms assets — he’s in the process of trying to start up a new much smaller ($250 =- $500 million) version of the ill fated Sowood. According to the Boston Globe:
Tags: Bear Stearns, Credit Crunch, Fed, JPM Chase, Legal, Liquidations / implosions, Real Estate, Revolving Door
Ten bucks is a step in the right direction after their $2 steal of the century bid made last weekend: According to the New York Times, JP Morgan is in hot and heavy negotiations with Bear Stearns to up its bid for the company to $10 a share in stock. Especially given sloppy deal language that’s got Jamie Dimon ‘apoplectic’:
The sweetened offer is intended to win over
stockholders who vowed to fight the original fire-sale deal, struck only a week
ago at the behest of the Federal Reserve and Treasury Department.Under the terms being discussed, JPMorgan
would pay $10 a share in stock for Bear, up from its initial offer of $2 a share
— a figure that represented a mere one-fifteenth of Bear’s going market
price.The Fed, which must approve any new deal,
was balking at the new offer price on Sunday night after several days of
frantic, secret negotiations, these people said. As a result, it was still
possible the renegotiated deal might be postponed or collapse entirely, said
these people, who were granted anonymity because of their confidentiality
agreements.
Tags: Bear Stearns, Credit Crunch, JPM Chase, Liquidations / implosions
JP Morgan chief Jamie Dimon, who arguably made the deal of the century by picking off failing Bear Stearns for a paltry two bucks a share, paid over 400 of his vanquished (and understandably very hostile) captured troops a visit yesterday evening, asking for a chance. Dimon is looking to retain the best of Bear’s staffers, but it was also crystal clear that many of the 14,000 employees would lose their jobs. The possibly good news: those who stay could receive 25% of their Bear Stearns stock in shares of JPM as well as a one time cash payment. Here are some quotes from the NY Times account of the meeting:
“I don’t think Bear did anything to
deserve this,” Mr. Dimon said. “Our hearts go out to you.”“No one on Wall Street could have
anticipated this,” he continued. “I feel terrible sometimes when people
think we took advantage. I don’t think we could possibly know what you all are
feeling, but I hope that you give JPMorgan a chance.”Over the next 45 minutes, Mr. Dimon made it
clear that he hoped to retain the best employees at Bear but also made it plain
that many of Bear’s 14,000 employees will lose their jobs as a result of the
deal, struck at the urging of the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department.
JPMorgan executives plan to cull one Bear employee after another, while keeping
the best performers, as they move to integrate the two firms.
Tags: Alan Schwartz, Bear Stearns, Credit Crunch, Jamie Dimon, JPM Chase, Liquidations / implosions
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Tags: Bear Stearns, Credit Crunch, Fed, JPM Chase, Liquidations / implosions, Real Estate, Revolving Door
This is just sad: Reuters tells us (and shows us) that Bear Stearns employees in its NYC headquarters were greeted this morning: by a two dollar bill taped to the revolving door:
Staff at Bear Stearns’ Manhattan
headquarters were welcomed to work on Monday by a two-dollar bill stuck to the
revolving doors — a spoof on the bargain-basement price of $2 per share that
JPMorgan Chase is offering for the firm. A hopeful Coldwell Banker real estate
agent was hawking cheap apartments to employees who saw the value of their stock
options go up in smoke.
Bear fire sale sparks financial rout – Reuters
Tags: Bear Stearns, Credit Crunch, JPM Chase, Liquidations / implosions
(Click to enlarge).
In addition to insiders and Joe Lewis getting obliterated, other large holders, at least as of 12/31 when their 13F’s were filed, included Morgan Stanley, Legg Mason, Barclays, State Street, Vanguard, Janus, Fidelity, UBS, and Goldman Sachs. Did some of these funds sell? If they were smart they did, but if they didn’t they could be smarting big time…..
Tags: Bear Stearns, Credit Crunch, JPM Chase, Liquidations / implosions
Deal Journal gave us the answer yesterday afternoon. It’s choice "C": he was playing bridge in Detroit, at the North American Bridge Championship. He’s no longer Bear Stearns’ CEO, so not actively at the helm of his on-the-precipice firm, to be sure — he’s non-executive chairman. But he’s losing millions by the minute (at least with yesterday’s 27 point plunge (see chart below)), so perhaps like golf, and the occasional hit of marijuana, (we’re still waiting for the specific denial), it might be helping him relax and deaden the pain. In any case, his bridge game doesn’t appear to be hurting all that badly from the turmoil where he’s well ahead of most of the pack. Deal Journal reports:
So far, he’s faring better than his
firm. In the “Imp Pairs” event Thursday, Mr. Cayne and a partner placed fourth out of 130, according to figures from the American Contract Bridge League web site. (Bear shares fell 7%.) The playing took place between about 1
p.m. and 5 p.m. in the afternoon and 7:30 to 11 p.m. in the evening, say
insiders – a period in which Bear CEO Alan Schwartz convened a series of
conference calls with directors, according to people familiar with the matter,
to discuss a pending cash pledge from J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and the Federal Reserve Board. Still, Mr. Cayne participated in at least some of the dialogue, said one of these people.
The 74-year-old Mr. Cayne, who did not respond to a request for comment left
at his New York office, has been back in the game today, says an attendee,
amid the formal announcement of Bear’s liquidity infusion and its stock’s
47% plummet. No word yet on his performance.
Where in the World is Bear’s Jimmy Cayne? Playing Bridge. – WSJ Deal Journal
Tags: Bear Stearns, Credit Crunch, Jim Cayne, Liquidations / implosions
It’s finally over for Carlyle Capital, Carlyle Group’s mortgage bond fund…..
Talks on a so-called standstill agreement
with lenders failed, Amsterdam-listed Carlyle Capital Corp. said in a statement
last night. Through March 12, the company has defaulted on about $16.6 billion
of debt, and any remaining debt is expected “soon” to go into default,
according to the statement.Carlyle Capital sought refinancing on its residential mortgage-backed
securities. Those negotiations failed late yesterday after a pricing service
used by some lenders reported a decrease in the value of its mortgage-back
assets, the firm said. Carlyle expects additional margin calls today of $97.5
million.“The basis on which lenders are willing to provide financing against the
company’s collateral has changed so substantially that a successful refinancing
is not possible,” Carlyle said in the statement.
Carlyle Capital Fails to Reach Accord; Lenders to Seize Assets - Bloomberg
Tags: Carlyle, Credit Crunch, Liquidations / implosions, Toe Tags
Peloton Partners is wasting no time winding down — it’s putting its Soho offices up for sale:
Peloton is still in the process of winding
down its remaining $1.6bn multi-strategy fund, which is expected to return to
clients less than half of what their investments were worth at the start of
February.The swiftness with which Peloton has moved
to find new tenants for its offices – two floors of the trendy Ingeni
building, a former Ford design studio on Broadwick Street – suggests it is
keen to avoid further losses for the partnership.
Tags: Credit Crunch, Hedge funds, Liquidations / implosions, Real Estate
Now it’s also pulling the plug on its second fund — the Multi-Strategy fund, and closing shop….
Tags: Credit Crunch, Hedge funds, Liquidations / implosions, Toe Tags
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