Lesson Learned

2003年1月，Lazard的38亿美元的对冲基金业务骑行高。由Star Manager William Von Mueffling领导 - 世卫组织于1998年8月至2002年12月举办了58％的年度回报率，距离Lazard欧洲机会基金 - 可尊敬的投资银行似乎是成为主要球员的边缘。但幕后的幕后拉萨德的对冲基金业务即将崩溃。

In a bitter dispute over compensation, von Mueffling, then 34, was threatening to walk. He wanted to be paid in

与他团队对Lazard资产管理的贡献的比例，该公司的金钱管理部门。2002年，Von Mueffling的集团占林居民的25％的收入。

Von Mueffling’s demands required a cultural change that Lazard was unwilling to make. Bruce Wasserstein, the legendary deal maker brought in by Lazard senior partner Michel David-Weill one year earlier to head the firm, was known for paying plenty for the best people, but he couldn’t hold on to von Mueffling.

Lazard wasn’t willing to single out one person for the group’s success. In a statement at the time, the firm said, “Hedge fund management at Lazard is a team effort, and one of the team has resigned.” Von Mueffling wasn’t mentioned.

But his departure proved devastating for Lazard. By the time he resurfaced eight months later as the head of his own firm, New York–based Cantillon Capital Management (see box, page 33), von Mueffling had been joined by several of the people who had helped manage about $3 billion in hedge fund assets at Lazard. Many of Lazard’s hedge fund investors also followed von Mueffling to Cantillon. LAM’s hedge fund assets fell to just $900 million.

The von Mueffling debacle was a public blow that came at a very delicate time for Lazard, a private partnership that Wasserstein was lobbying to take public against opposition from David-Weill, whose great-grandfather co-founded the investment bank in 1848. Wasserstein knew it was crucial to portray the firm as stable, growing and well managed — not the image projected by the problems at the hedge fund business.

After finally securing David-Weill’s consent, Wasserstein took Lazard public in May 2005, a move perfectly timed for the recent boom in investment banking, Lazard’s specialty. As of mid-September its shares were trading at about $40, up 60 percent from its $25 IPO.

Lazard开始在IPO之前重建对冲基金运营。2004年3月，Wasserstein聘请了长期信徒的Ashish Bhutani担任林首席执行官，该首席执行官负责管理大约800亿美元的机构，金融中介机构和富裕人士。在Buhutani，林已推出九个新的对冲基金 - 现有的投资组合管理团队和由公司以外招募的管理人员六个。LAM将基金销售到全球的广泛投资者，包括养老基金和其他机构，其中一些曾在其资金中占有资金。现在，冯Mueffling的出发三年半，对冲基金资产返回为38亿美元。

“对冲基金业务是我们为客户所做的重要组成部分，”Bhutani说。“这是我们资产管理业务的杰出突出的延伸。”

But as Lazard was playing catch-up, the hedge fund universe was expanding. In 2003, Lazard was No. 39 on the Hedge Fund 100, a ranking of the world’s biggest hedge fund firms by Institutional Investor’s sister publication, Alpha, with year-end 2002 assets of $3.3 billion. This year, based on its year-end 2005 assets of $3.5 billion, Lazard narrowly failed to make the list.

这并不seem to faze Bhutani. “We could easily be significantly larger,” he says. “But we are selective because we don’t want to dilute the power of the brand. We are not looking to be the biggest. We’re looking to be the best.”

对于Lazard，与大多数资产管理公司一样，对冲基金业务是一个有利的钱制造商。虽然占总资产的4.5％，但对冲基金的占LAM的4.66亿美元的20％占2005年的4.66亿美元。Lazard的长期资金平均每项管理费为65个基点;其对冲基金收取150个基点的管理费和绩效的奖励费用。

奖励费用可以是对冲基金公司的巨大利润司机，但最近一些林资金的表现已经平庸。不丹和其他顶级林高管表示，他们判断基金的成功三到五年。他们的大部分新资金已经存在不到两个。

The biggest long-term challenge for Lazard may be retaining top-performing hedge fund managers. Balancing the interests and the compensation requirements of its hedge fund business with those of its traditional asset management business remains difficult.

“我们相信我们为我们的专业人士提供了一个非常有竞争力的赔偿包，”不明确决定从未挑起了与明星基金经理的摊牌，他提出与他一起离开并提起重要客户的摊牌。他认为，Lazard为熟练的专业人士创造了有意义的激励，以运行对冲基金并制作大量资金。

资产管理公司通常将其对冲基金管理人员支付至少一半的激励费。虽然LAM将没有提供具体细节，但国际和全球投资副主席John Reinsberg说：“投资团队收到了慷慨的管理和绩效费用。这是一个绩效良好的业务。“与此同时，该公司制作了一系列的合同条款，包括延期赔偿条款，为其管理人员提供了强有力的抑制因素。

Ashish BHUTANI HAS KNOWN Bruce Wasserstein since 1989, when he was recruited from Salomon Brothers to Wasserstein Perella Group to work with the investment banking boutique’s most important high-yield-debt clients. The Indian-born Bhutani, who has an MBA in finance and international business from New York’s Pace University, went on to become deputy chairman of Wasserstein Perella and later co-CEO for North America of Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein after Dresdner Bank bought Wasserstein’s firm in 2001.

不久之后不丹接过林的负责人，他派出了两条轨道，以重建其对冲基金业务。一个是使用内部投资团队启动对冲基金产品，该团队已经为公司的机构资金运行了策略。林已创建三个资金：Lazard新兴收入，Lazard欧洲发现和Lazard世界替代价值（参见框，第34页）。

共同管理人员Ardra Belitz和Ganesh Ramachandran经营于2004年3月推出的新兴收入基金。该基金投资于坦桑尼亚和埃及等国家的机会。

2005年10月，Lazard推出了欧洲发现基金，该基金投资于欧洲公司的多达40个股票证券，该公司的市场资本化欧元兑美元（12.7亿美元）或更低。由Brian Pessin和Edward Rosenfeld管理的基金遵循唯一的策略。

Earlier this year Lazard launched the World Alternative Value fund to invest in equity securities whose share prices trade at a discount to their underlying net asset value. Manager Kun Deng trolls for buying opportunities among closed-end funds, investment trusts and corporate restructurings. He hedges by shorting closed-end funds trading at a premium to net asset value, exchange-traded funds and various indexes.

Lazard’s second approach for developing new funds is to lure managers or entire teams from other firms, looking for people thinking of starting their own hedge funds but not interested in dealing with the noninvestment tasks that come with running a business. Lazard has hired three such groups so far. In December 2003 the firm recruited Robert Rowland from New York–based Soros Funds, where he had managed European equities for the Quantum Endowment Fund. Rowland, who spent seven years at Soros, manages LAM’s European Explorer fund, which began investing in March 2004.

Also in 2004, Lazard brought in Matthew Bills and his Japanese long-short team from Deutsche Asset Management to start the Japan Alternative Investment Series. Bills, a onetime Fidelity Investments analyst and portfolio manager, is based in Japan. The four funds, which pursue different strategies, were launched between October 2005 and June of this year.

Lazard还抓住了来自Deutsche Bank的Smudder集团的六人球队。他们经营Lazard韩国公司治理基金。该基金于4月推出，该基金由John Lee领导，此后曾担任韩国基金，自1991年以来，闭合终端共同基金。新的对冲基金投资于预计从改善受益的小和中期南朝鲜股票公司治理。

Bhutani would like to grow LAM’s hedge fund business to a dozen or so teams. But to avoid tarnishing the Lazard name, which is still powerful, especially in Europe, he is being picky. The three teams Lazard has recruited were chosen from roughly 250 groups that the firm interviewed. Rowland and his team, for example, met with Lazard several times before signing their deal.

Lazard的选择性正在安慰一些公司的长期投资者。“我们很高兴Lazard没有高度的外形，”纽约的工程和制造公司ITT公司的白皮助理助理助手“他们不是资产收集者”。ITT在Lazard自20世纪90年代中期以来的唯一一家唯一一家唯一投资于世界替代价值基金。

Lazard寻找投资过程是连贯，可解释的，最重要的，最重要的经理的经理。潜在的管理人员必须使用他们的策略有一个很好的轨道记录。

与其他大资产管理公司一样，Lazard通过提供管理人员需要运行业务的基础设施，包括销售，营销，贸易，后台，合规性，会计和客户服务等基础设施来诱惑人才。“Lazard必须提供的伟大的事情是，它允许管理人员做他们应该做的事情 - 管理资金 - 而不是专注于运营，”冯·穆弗林承认。

In addition, Lazard touts the advantages that come from being part of a big, successful asset management shop: access to corporate management and to LAM’s network of about 60 analysts, as well as the firm’s huge asset base and investment clout.

分析师是投资过程的一个组成部分。Lazard揭开了对冲基金的奖励池，分析师根据其对资金回报的贡献份额。与分析师分享绩效费用有助于Lazard招募并留住顶级人民。

Essentially, Lazard is challenging managers to choose between making more money for themselves and presiding over a potentially bigger business within LAM’s supportive organization. However, von Mueffling’s solo performance makes this recruitment pitch a tough sell. He is a paradigm of the benefits of being entrepreneurial. He has made more than $100 million in 2004 and at least $200 million in 2005.

Bhutani admits that successful managers could make more money on their own. But he stresses that Lazard offers significant advantages. Japan Alternative Investment Series manager Bills considered going independent, but he joined Lazard so he could spend all his time on investing and have access to the firm’s intelligence. Rowland agrees: “Lazard Asset Management has a powerful intellectual pool to bounce ideas off.”

The challenge of attracting and retaining talented hedge fund managers is not unique to Lazard. Jes Staley, New York–based global head of asset and wealth management at JPMorgan Chase & Co., which manages $900 billion, including $25 billion in hedge funds, says every firm has to deal with this issue when developing and growing a hedge fund business within a big asset management operation.

“The most important thing is for the traditional investment management people to agree that growth in the [hedge fund business] makes sense,” he says. “It’s not easy.”

Staley说，他要求人们给他授予他的前提，即客户愿意为服务支付的金额是一个公平的衡量他们归因于它的价值。投资者“将支付200个基点和25％[绩效]对冲基金经理，他们对他们有信心的对冲基金经理，”Staley解释道。“他们正在用钱包和他们支付的费用投票。”

对于所有的选择性，Lazard尚未将其新资金作为顶级表演者建立 - 而其中一些较大的资金正在摇摇欲坠。例如，新兴收入基金在2005年上涨2.44％，到今年前六个月的2.77％。与同期期间，以10.82％和4.69％的回报与4.82％和4.69％的回报率相比，固定收入对冲基金指数。

LAM’s European Explorer fund’s performance has been inconsistent. The $700 million fund was up 10 percent last year. “For a European fund, that is not great,” says Antoine Bernheim, a consultant to European investors. Indeed, the average European fund rose nearly 13 percent last year, while von Mueffling’s Cantillon Europe fund was up about 26 percent. Although European Explorer lagged the comparable Eurekahedge European index in 2005 (up 10.1 percent versus 12.7 percent), it has been beating its benchmark for the first six months of this year (up 8.5 percent versus 5.43 percent).

Meanwhile, Lazard’s $800 million Global Opportunities, a global long-short equity fund launched in 1993 and run by Michael Rome, has faded from its past glory. According to an April 2001 interview published on Bernheim’s Web site, hedgefundnews.com, during the preceding eight years, Global Opportunities had an average annualized return of 22.4 percent. In four of the past five years, however, its returns have ranged from –1 percent to 6 percent. Even in 2003, when the fund was up 22 percent, it underperformed the broader market; the MSCI world index was up a net 33.1 percent that year. For the first six months of this year, the the fund rose 2.64 percent, compared with 5.49 percent for the Eurekahedge global hedge fund index.

尽管它不含恒星的投资表现，Lazard吸引了比几年前更广泛的投资者。当Von Mueffling是明星时，该公司的大部分资产是欧洲，包括来自私人瑞士银行及其富有客户的大型块。这些天Lazard拥有更多样化的客户群，包括捐赠，基金会，高净值个人和对冲基金的资金。它还吸引了美国和亚洲的更多客户。

“It has a solid institutional base of business,” says Bernheim. Indeed, many investors say Lazard’s name still has a fair amount of cachet.

康涅狄格州Weston资本资产管理的投资组合经理Barclay Leib的投资者对Von Mueffling Leaug感到失望，仍然捍卫Lazard的决定让他离开。“在更大的机构和一个有才华的人之间的关系中有一个意义，在那里非常困难地使经济学工作”，“林斯说，他的公司管理了17亿美元。

Lazard还对其赔偿协议进行了一些关键变革，以确保与Von Mueffling的Clout的某人的离开不会重复。经理合同呼吁在几年内进行大量递延付款。Lazard不会进一步详细说明。该公司增加了限制性契约，防止管理人员与其他投资公司合作，并在他们离开后在特定的时间内注册Lazard客户。

“坚定的安排使得牢固的朋友，”罗兰说。“我喜欢我的合同的清晰度。我有一个非常好的交易。“

Notes Bhutani: “We believe we provide a very competitive and fair compensation package for all of our professionals. They are generously compensated in years in which they perform well, and can still receive a reasonable compensation in the years when performance is not as strong. This structure better aligns the interests of our clients, portfolio managers and the firm. I believe that, if we had this in place in years past, managers would have had a stronger incentive to stay.”

That hoped-for staff stability can only help Lazard and its investors. So far the firm has recouped all the hedge fund assets it lost following the departure of von Mueffling, thanks to its ability to create and market new strategies and its brand-name appeal. Although Lazard has struggled to put up outstanding investment returns, even as its former star is thriving, Bhutani is confident that his current group of hedge fund managers will be able to turn around their performance.