The top 20 hedge funds made their investors $16.1 billion last year
London-based fund-of-funds LCH Investments published its annual list of the top 20 “great money managers” for 2016.
The list, produced using the fund of funds’ estimates and data from eVestment, measures net gains, after fees, of hedge fund managers over the course of their careers. It also includes the net gains for 2016.
Ray Dalio, the founder of Bridgewater Associates, the world’s largest hedge fund, held the No. 1 spot after his hedge fund made investors $4.9 billion last year.
George Soros’ family-office hedge fund maintained its No. 2 post even after the fund lost an estimated $1 billion last year. Soros has produced net gains of $41.8 billion since 1973.
John Paulson’s Paulson & Co. fell from the No. 7 spot to No. 13. Paulson & Co. lost an estimated $3 billion in 2016, according to the report.
“Tiger Cubs” Steve Mandel of Lone Pine and Andreas Halvorsen of Viking Capital also fell in the rankings after both funds had losing years.
Newcomers to the top 20 list include David Shaw of D.E. Shaw, Ken Griffin of Citadel, and John Overdeck and David Siegel of Two Sigma. Shaw took the No. 3 spot after making investors $1.2 billion in 2016, while Griffin landed at No. 5 after making $1 billion last year. Two Sigma, which launched in 2002, has made its investors $32 billion since its inception. The fund produced gains of $1.1 billion in 2016.
Collectively, the top 20 managers raked in $16.1 billion in net gains last year. As a group, they’ve produced combined net gains since its inception of $448.7 billion.
The top 20 funds oversee $535.6 billion in assets. The entire hedge fund industry is made up of 10,000-plus hedge funds. Last year, total industry assets soared to a record above $3 trillion. That’s even as investors pulled $106 billion from the hedge fund industry in 2016, according to a recent report from eVestment.
For the most part, hedge funds had an underwhelming year in 2016. The HFRI Fund Weighted Composite Index – an equal-weighted index of hedge funds —gained 5.57% in 2016, while the S&P 500, a commonly used benchmark to compare performance, was up 12%. Of course, there’s always pockets of dispersion among fund managers and different strategies.
—
Julia La Roche is a finance reporter at Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter.
Read more: