The anti-hedge fund group Hedge Clippers held a protest of a fundraiser for New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the Hamptons on Saturday. More than 250 protesterscrashed the event held at the home of Daniel Loeb in East Hampton. Loeb has been a frequent target of the Hedge Clippers, who argue that hedge funds’ activities make inequality more extreme and that specific managers — Loeb included — have an undue influence over state politics. The group has also protested outside the home of Paul Tudor Jones II in Greenwich, Connecticut.
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Ryan Caldwell, who recently left mutual fund firm Waddell & Reed, has joined with a group of former Goldman Sachs bankers tocreate Chiron Investment Management. According to theWall Street Journal, Caldwell, who ran Waddell & Reed’s Ivy Asset Strategy Fund, teamed up with Marc Spilker, a Goldman Sachs veteran and former president of Apollo Management, former Goldman head of equity sales Enrico Gaglioti and Scott Prince of GPS Investment Partners to launch Chiron. The new fund will reportedly take a similar approach to that of Waddell & Reed, focusing on stocks, bonds and commodities. Ivy Asset Strategy Fund has lost $9.4 billion since May 2014, but Caldwell told theJournalhe plans to implement “tighter guardrails” at Chiron.
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Elliott Managementhasincreased pressure on Samsungin recent days, despite losing two legal efforts to block Cheil Industries’ planned purchase of the South Korean electronics maker, thus insuring insider control of the giant. The hedge fund led by Paul Singer has reportedly snapped up stakes in two Samsung-related companies in recent days, but theWall Street Journalreports that those companies — Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance and Samsung SDI — are unlikely to work against the interests of the parent company when it comes to the merger.
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While firms that manage hedge funds and mutual funds have been increasing pressure on the companies they invest in to focus on gender equality, few funds provide proof that they’re following that mandate themselves. According to aFinancial Timesstory published Sunday, of 10 firms the paper asked for transparency on the subject,only one — Aberdeen Asset Management — responded. The rest, including BlackRock and Vanguard, declined to provide proof of diversity.