Meanwhile, Back in Alternative Asset Land

Many investors and investment committees have flocked to alternative assets in recent years in a desperate search for better performance.

Unfortunately, in most cases, the performance of these funds - purportedly run by more clever and sophisticated money managers than those at traditional investment management shops - have not only failed to produce returns as advertised.

Mary Ann Bartels of Merrill Lynch has been tracking the hedge fund community for several years now, and puts out a regular report on their performance.

Here's what she said in a report published yesterday;

Hedge funds up 1.26% in 1H’12, underperforming S&P 500

The global diversified hedge fund composite index was up 1.26% for the first half of 2012, underperforming the S&P 500’s 8.31%. Convertible Arbitrage fared the best, up 4.14%. Short bias performed the worst, down 7.11%.

http://rcr.ml.com/Archive/11182388.pdf?w=dglen%40bpbtc.com&q=5mwrEXSECrJLh1aoR6Ankw&__gda__=1341945816_0b176de792c154c47abb536429834224



The 12 month numbers are even worse.

For the year ending June 30, 2012, the composite return of diversified hedge funds was -5.22%.

Returns by category ranged from -0.62% for fund specializing in convertible arbitrage to -10.47% for equity long/short strategies (supposedly a field where smart managers should shine).

By comparison, for the last 12 months, the S&P 500 was up +5.3%.

Now, to be sure, the last year has been a difficult one for active managers.  As I mentioned in an earlier post, most of the outperformance in the equity markets has been in lower quality securities, or one stock (Apple is up +60% over the last year).

But still.