Dymon Asia's US$3b macro hedge fund lost 10.45% in Jan: data

[LONDON] Dymon Asia's US$3.1 billion macro hedge fund lost 10.45 per cent in January, performance data seen by Reuters showed, a month where many peers lost heavily after a surprise rise in the Swiss franc.

Singapore-based Dymon, set up by Danny Yong, a former founding partner and chief investment officer of Abax Global Capital, is one of Asia's biggest home-grown hedge fund firms with about US$4.5 billion worth of assets under management.

The exact reason for the decline could not be confirmed but the loss wiped out a large chunk of the gains the hedge fund earned in 2014. The fund returned 18.75 per cent last year, when macro hedge funds as measured by industry tracker Eurekahedge gained just 4 per cent on average.

Dymon Asia President Jay Luo declined to comment.

Macro hedge funds, which focus on major economic trends and bet on assets such as stocks, currencies, bonds, commodities and indices, gained 2.2 per cent last month, but several of them suffered losses after a surprise decision by the Swiss National Bank to remove a cap on the franc.

Losers include London-based hedge fund COMAC Capital, the US$750 million Harness Macro Currency Strategy, which lost 8.8 per cent, and the Fortress Macro Fund, which declined by about 7 per cent.

REUTERS