The Eurekahedge Greater China Hedge Fund Index ended 2019 up 16.83% on the back of the region’s underlying equity market rally. The US$29.4 billion mandate has seen US$2.0 billion of performance growth, offset by US$0.3 billion of investor redemptions over the year.

Privium’s Vanessa Hemavathi with Hedge Funds Club boss Stefan Nilsson in Hong Kong in 2019

Vanessa Hemavathi, Head of Investment Services in Asia for Privium Fund Management in Hong Kong, has been appointed as head of the Asian chapter of hedge fund industry charity Help For Children. Prior to joining Privium in 2019, Hemavathi spent three years as program director for the Henley Executive Hedge Fund Program. Help For Children, founded in 1998 by representatives of the hedge fund industry, is dedicated to the prevention and treatment of child abuse.

Ashley Tang

Ashley Tang has joined New York-headquartered multi-strategy investment firm Boothbay Fund Management in a Hong Kong-based business development role. Her responsibilities will include sourcing emerging Asian hedge fund investments and assisting in due diligence. Since graduating from Queen’s University in Canada, Tang has spent a number of years with the Hong Kong-based hedge fund platform business of OP Investment Management.

Vanessa Hemavathi

Privium Fund Management has recruited Vanessa Hemavathi as Head of Investment Services in its Hong Kong office. She will focus on developing Privium’s business in the Asia-Pacific region. Most recently, Hemvathi spent three years with Inflection Point Intelligence where she has been a program director working on the global expansion of the Henley Executive Hedge Fund Program. Prior to that, she worked on corporate and commercial partnerships at The Wall Street Journal.

Carol Hu of CQS

Carol Hu has joined CQS in Hong Kong as VP of Business Development. Most recently, she was COO at Platina Capital Management. Earlier in her career, she has had stints as a trader at Bin Yuan Capital and Prime Capital Management. CQS is a credit-focused multi-strategy asset manager founded in 1999.

The Eurekahedge Hedge Fund Index was up 0.62% in July, bringing its year-to-date return to 6.48%. Roughly 30.8% of hedge fund managers in the index have recorded double-digit gains over the first seven months of the year. The Eurekahedge Greater China Hedge Fund Index gained 0.51% in July, bringing its year-to-date gain to 10.37%. Investor confidence in the US$28.4 billion mandate remained robust with US$0.9 billion of net inflows recorded in 2018, despite the US$2.3 billion performance decline over the same year.

Yasuhiro Kawakami

Yasuhiro Kawakami has joined the Tokyo office of Algebris Investments as a Managing Director. He has spent the past two years at PIMCO and was previously at Citi and Goldman Sachs. However, he has spent most of his career at IFC – International Finance Corporation as a Senior Financial Officer. Algebris is a global asset management firm with multiple investment strategies founded in 2006.

Geoff Barker

Portfolio manager Geoff Barker in Hong Kong has joined US$17bn fund house CQS following the collapse of City Financial where he previously housed his Counterpoint Asia macro fund. Prior to joining City Financial in 2013, Barker was part of the macro fund team at Ballingal Investment Advisors for eight years. Earlier in his career, he was HSBC’s chief economist in Asia-Pacific and also had stints at Dresdner Kleinwort Benson, Schroders, Baring Securities and Smith New Court Far East. Barker is expected to bring several team members with him to CQS, including Nick Bibby, Neil Scrase, Vishal Mahtani, Chrisy Law, Amanda Chan and Ivan Kan.

Chris Antonelli

Chris Antonelli, who last year left Nomura, has joined investment manager Schonfeld as its new co-head of the Asian business. He finished his ten years at Nomura as Global Head of Prime Finance. Immediately prior to that, he served as Head of Prime Services, Asia-Pacific. He started his career in 1998 at Lehman Brothers where he spent a decade before Nomura took over that business.

The Eurekahedge Asia ex-Japan Hedge Fund Index was up 7.87% year-to-date as of the end of April, supported by the recovering Asian equity markets throughout the first four months of 2019. The Asia ex-Japan mandate has witnessed US$2.4 billion of investor redemptions year-to-date, despite robust performance gains totalling US$7.6 billion over the same period.