As a subsidiary of Minnesota-based Cargill, Black River Capital’s deal has made the commodities giant the largest privately-owned business in the United States.

Cargill’s primary dealings include trading, purchasing and distributing grain, as well as other agricultural wares. The company produces food ingredients like starch, vegetable oils and fat, manufactures and sells livestock and feed and trades energy, steel and transport.

AgriNurture, a fruit and vegetable producer, wholesaler and exporter, is currently working to increase and expand its business dramatically. It is in the process of establishing a $5 million factory to support its supply of coconut juice to the American Vita Coco, while last year it acquired 51% of the Big Chill fruit shake franchise. Antonio Tiu, the company’s president, revealed their hopes to make the Big Chill an international brand.

In an interview on On the Move, Lagrange explained that the fund will “focus on industrials, exporting companies and oil companies.” Bullish bets will be made on “all these things that are more dominated by what’s happening in the world and less by European sovereign” debt disaster.

European stocks have continued to fall, forcing Greece, Ireland and Portugal to request bailouts. Italy is concerned the crisis will spread. Since February 17^th, the Stoxx Europe 600 Index has turned down 6.5%. GLG European hedge fund has nearly tripled over the course of the last ten years, while the Stoxx 600 have decreased by 14%.

In the interview, Lagrange said the fund will be managed by himself, Simon Savage and Darren Hodges.

“It’s really very, very difficult to analyze,” he said. “So we try to spend more time on other companies where it’s slightly more logical over the medium term. There may be extraordinary” possibilities with banks “but we find the risk-return is better in other sectors.”

TerribleTrouble for Trimble?

Former hedge fund manager Mark S. Trimble who has already begun his decade-long stint in jail for money laundering may be facing additional charges.  He was arrested for illegal commodities market trading after he had been barred in 2009 due to money laundering, moving finances from investor funds into his own personal account. Rather than investing money from his cycling coach, he kept the cash for his own use.  This was quite a sum too – a staggering $111,000 – and the coach himself lost out on $40,000.

Now, Trimble is also facing wire and mail fraud charges as well as money laundering “that could land him behind bars for an additional 30 years.”

Untrustworthy Trimble

Clearly, Trimble could not be trusted.  He had told his coach he could make good trades for him, asking for various money transfers which he received (from the innocent man’s wife and son) in “multiple transactions between September 2009 and January 2011.

Just last year, Trimble “pleaded guilty to money laundering, admitting he had transferred $1 million of a client's money into his own account in May 2007 after it had been given to him to invest in various securities,” being forced to pay over $9 million in restitution on being sentenced.

Ribotsky explains that he has seen many types of investing styles, from investors with a large number of different transactions as well as investors with quite a lot of different focuses. Many of these deals that he has seen are from other investment banks or other private equity investment firms. These deals are happening with a lot of partnerships. According to Ribotsky, one of the greatest benefits that has come from this market is the co-generation of ideas.

What we are anxiously awaiting is the moment when the inevitable new influx of innovative and revolutionary technologies and services emerge so that we can be a part of it.

Former Hedge Fund President Norshield Financial Group, John Xanthoudakis is the fourth person to have been arrested for allegedly masterminding a C$120 million fraud.  The scam involves the ex-TV production company for children, Cinar.  While he may have been successful until now, it seems Xanthoudakis played a little bit too much like a child in a candy store and is now paying the price for eating too many sweets.  On his return from Bermuda today, he was reprimanded in custody and will appear in court later on today.

He is being held for 36 counts of fraud and forgery.  He established a way of “illegally investing Cinar’s capital in Norshield to reap the profits for themselves and for two other alleged conspirators.”  But not all games work, as Xanthoudakis found out to his dismay, following the collapse of Norshield which resulted in shareholders from Cinar  suing the defunct hedge fund.

The firm’s Tokyo office is presently led by their Japanese country representative Scott Roney, who runs an office of just two employees. The fund will bring in more employees to develop hedge fund strategies for institutional investors.

Caxton has already sent one of its senior portfolio managers to head the new Australian branch.

Results such as these indicate that the United Kingdom’s higher taxes and stricter regulations are not preventing hedge fund managers from striking out on their own. The increase also reflects the fact that net inflows have returned to the industry after a two-year hiatus. Specifically, industry net inflows exceeded $42 billion during the first nine months of 2010, according to Hedge Fund Research.