Barclay Hedge Fund Index Reveals December Loss

January 15, 2012 James Heinsman Hedge Funds

The Barclay Hedge Fund Index revealed that hedge funds fell 0.38% in December, with the Index marked 5.37% lower at the end of last year.

“Equity markets started the month with a sell-off, and then went on to rally going into Christmas,” Sol Waksman of BarclayHedge said. “Unfortunately, markets that see-saw can be quite difficult for managers to navigate successfully.

“Dramatic volatility in global equity markets created significant challenge for fund managers throughout 2011, evidenced by the fact that 60 percent of funds reported a loss for the year.

“This lead to an underperformance by hedge funds of 7.39 percent compared to the S&P 500, the worst since the 10.69 percent gap in performance back in 2003.”

The first quarter of 2011 still saw overall gains for hedge funds.

Waksman went on to explain that “although Emerging Markets Index was the poorest performer of the sectors that we track (having lost 13.02%), investors continue to be attracted to the strategy, s evidenced by inflows of $7.6 billion in the past 12 months.”

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