Opalesque Hong Kong Roundtable: Reverse Brain Drain from New York, London Boosts Asian Hedge Fund Industry

New York, NY, May 20, 2009 --(PR.com)-- Asian hedge fund veterans said at a recent Opalesque Roundtable that looking back over the last 10 or 15 years "about all Asian investors at that time had absolutely no interest in hedge funds, in fact they thought they were very bad or illegal products."

Then the Asian hedge fund veterans said at a recent Opalesque Roundtable that looking back over the last 10 or 15 years "about all Asian investors at that time had absolutely no interest in hedge funds, in fact they thought they were very bad or illegal products".

Then the Asian financial crisis of 1997/98 made people realize that long-only leveraged equities or property were not necessarily the best asset classes, so they started to be interested in structured products or hedged vehicles. For many years, there was no interest in Asian-based hedge funds. If they were interested investing in a hedge fund product, they would go into a New York or London managed product.

However, the dynamics are changing. Chunli Hou, Co-founder and Principal of Andante Capital Management believes that "Asia has a larger pool of quantitative talents we can recruit and integrate going forward due to the effects of the global financial crisis and regional power shifts".

The following hedge fund managers, experts and hedge fund investors participated at the Opalesque Hong Kong Roundtable which took place at the local office of Newedge Group, who also sponsored the event:

1. George Long, Founder and Chief Investment Officer, LIM Advisors
2. Tim Rainsford, Managing Director Asia Pacific, Man Investments
3. Craig James, Portfolio Manager, AM Investment Partners
4. Kirby Daley, Senior Strategist and Head of Capital Introductions Asia, Newedge Group
5. Andrew Higgins, Co-Founder, Northwest Funds
6. Chunli Hou, Co-founder and Principal of Andante Capital Management
7. Brian MacDougall, Executive Director, 3A Asia

The Opalesque Hong Kong Roundtable can be downloaded here:
http://www.opalesque.com/RT/RoundtableHK2009.html

All other previously published Opalesque Roundtable Scripts can be accessed here:
http://www.opalesque.com/index.php?act=archiveRT

This 25 page Opalesque Roundtable also highlights:

Which strategies run by Asian hedge funds experience inflows?
What are Asian hedge fund investors looking for after the crisis?
How has the strategy break-down of Asian hedge fund start-ups changed, and why is it now more interesting than in the past?
What are the opportunities Asian hedge fund managers are pursuing at the moment?
Will the trend towards "institutionalization" slow down and boutiques reign going forward?
Is it true that most investors have traditionally invested based on these three crutches; size, track record, and quality of other investors? What instead should investors be looking for?
What is some of the latest research or innovation in finance coming out of Asia?
How does the licensing process work in Hong Kong? What are benefits for hedge funds to set up an office or run Asian strategies out of Hong Kong?
What structural deficits remain within the Asian financial infrastructure?

About Opalesque:
Matthias Knab, Director of Opalesque Ltd, moderates the Opalesque Roundtables. Matthias Knab is an internationally recognized expert on hedge funds and alternatives.

In 2003, with the publication of its daily Alternative Market Briefing, Opalesque successfully launched an information revolution in the hedge fund media space: "Opalesque changed the world by bringing transparency where there was opacity and by delivering an accurate professional reporting service." - Nigel Blanchard, Culross. This hybrid financial news service, which combines proprietary industry news stories and filtered third party reports, has been credited by many industry insiders with delivering precise, accurate, and vital information to a notoriously guarded audience.

Each week, Opalesque publications are read by more than 600,000 industry professionals in over 130 countries. Opalesque is the only daily hedge fund publisher which is actually read by the elite managers themselves (http://www.opalesque.com/op_testimonials.html).

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