The global economic crisis has left many sophisticated institutional investors reeling. Most are yet to fully recover even though markets have clawed back some of their early losses. Worst hit are the hedge funds with exposure to financials and commodities.
For instance, New York based Ospraie Fund that was worth some $2.8 billion at the start of August 2008 wound up later in the year as its holdings took a massive hit due to falling commodity prices. London based RAB Capital, which invests in small cap mining stocks, had to seek protection from redemptions due to falling commodity prices and consequent poor performance. Assets under management by RAB have reportedly fallen by 74% in 2008.
It is not only regular hedge funds that have crash landed but also mighty Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs). The Monitor Group, a US based consulting firm, estimates SWFs to have lost $57.2 billion on the publicly disclosed investments of $125.7 billion they have made since 2006. According to a working paper on Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) SWFs published by The Council on Foreign Relations (Brad Setser and Rachel Ziemba), SWFs in the GCC have lost as much as $350 billion in 2008. SWFs elsewhere haven’t faired any better.
SWFs are returning to the market again and are making big investments. Some of these investments are in strategically important assets to their sponsors; i.e. their respective governments. SWFs have made a wide range of investments covering a multitude of sectors such as banks, real estate, energy and technology.
With their massive wealth and sprawling investments, SWFs have marked the rise of state capitalism. Owned directly by a sovereign government and managed independently of other state financial institutions, SWFs were created to manage the country’s foreign exchange reserves. Some high profile SWF investments include $3 billion in Blackstone Private Equity Firm by the Chinese Investment Corporation (CIC), $75 billion in Citigroup by Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) and $800 million investment by Mudabala Investment Company from Abu Dhabi (Mudabala).
The advent of SWFs was viewed by many with considerable hostility and even prompted Mr. Larry Summers, the former US Treasury Secretary, to express concerns over potential threats by SWFs. Mr Summers’ concerns stem from the differences between investments by governments through SWFs and those by other conventional institutions as the former may have different motives. Mr…
