Fund of Funds 50
Continued interest among institutions and wealthy individuals has bolstered the assets run by funds of funds. Money managed by the constituent firms of Alpha 's 2003 Fund of Funds 50, our second annual list of the 50 largest multimanager hedge fund families, exceeded $211 billion as of June 30, 2003, up 24 percent from the year before. That amounts to almost one third of total hedge fund assets of $670 billion as of the end of first-half 2003, according to estimates by HFR, a sister company to fund-of-funds manager HFR Group (No. 48 in our ranking).
The top 50 firms are led by Zurich-based UBS, which runs $17.5 billion in funds of funds through four business units. UBS rises one spot to overtake last year's leader, London's Man Investments, in second place this year with more than $15 billion in multimanager hedge fund assets run through Chicago-based Glenwood Capital Investments and RMF Investment Management of Pfäffikon, Switzerland. Debuting this year at No. 3 is HSBC Private Banking Holdings (Suisse), headquartered in Geneva, which runs more than $9 billion, most of it in advisory mandates. Rounding out the top five are Seattle's Quellos Capital Management, repeating in fourth, and Ivy, rising two notches from last year.
The Hedge Fund 100 ranking methodology Institutional money is swelling the coffers of the world's biggest hedge fund managers, which are topped by Bruce Kovner's Caxton Associates.
"Plan sponsors are craving some kind of investment that is heavily alpha-oriented. And there's nothing more alpha than hedge funds," says Carrie McCabe, president of McCabe Advisors, a New York-