16/12/2011 Author: Will Wainewright

HFMWeek Daily Snapshot - 16 December

NEWSPAPERS AND WIRES
Boyer Allan Investment Management is shutting two of its hedge funds after losses and a fall in assets this year, four sources familiar with the matter said, lengthening the list of Asia focused funds that have closed this year, writes Reuters. The company, which managed about $1.8bn in three products before the financial crisis, was shutting its pan-Asia Boyer Allan Pacific fund after an 18.7% loss up to the end of November, two of the sources said.

Michael Platt, the founder of the $30bn hedge fund BlueCrest Capital Management, said most of the banks in Europe are insolvent and the situation will worsen in 2012 as the region’s debt crisis accelerates, says Bloomberg. “I do not take any exposure to banks at all if I can avoid it,” Platt said today in a TV interview. If European lenders had to mark their books to markets every day in the same way hedge funds do, most would be proven “insolvent,” he said.

Management consultant Rupinder Sidhu was found guilty of 22 counts of insider dealing and sentenced to two years in prison by a London court on Thursday, reports Reuters. The Financial Services Authority said Sidhu, with Anjam Ahmad, an ex-hedge fund trader and risk manager at AKO Capital, engaged in insider dealing in 18 UK and European shares between May and August of 2009.

Sino-Forest Corp's biggest shareholder, previously a staunch ally of the timber company in its defence against fraud allegations, on Thursday called on the Chinese-Canadian firm to name a new chief executive and replace board members, according to the Wall Street Journal. Richard Chandler Corp. also called "disappointing and regrettable" Sino-Forest's decision this week to skip an interest payment of about $10m, due Thursday, on some of its outstanding convertible notes.

Lehman Brothers Holdings sued Bank of America and Barclays PLC for breach of contract after they agreed to sell a stake in Archstone to Sam Zell’s Equity Residential, Archstone’s “largest competitor,” according to court papers, writes Bloomberg. Lehman told the banks it would buy half of their stake in Archstone, its biggest real estate asset, for $1.33bn, meeting a deadline to exercise its right to make the purchase, according to a lawsuit filed yesterday.

PEOPLE MOVES
Goldman Sachs Group has named Pete Lyon as co-head of its business that caters to private equity and hedge fund clients in the Americas, according to an internal memo distributed Thursday morning, according to Reuters. Lyon, who first joined the bank as an analyst in 1990, will lead Goldman's financial sponsors group in the Americas with co-head Alison Mass, according to the memo obtained by Reuters.