By Hedge Fund Insight staff
Asked the question “which two or three are the most important strategic priorities to your firm?” hedge fund management companies gave this collective response:
source: Ernst & Young 2013 global hedge fund and investor survey
While growth is clearly the top priority of the CEOs running hedge fund management companies, the choice of what is the top priority within growth is evenly split. It is no surprise in the period post the JOBS Act ruling from the Fed and 40 Act Funds being retailed out that developing additional distribution networks is seen as a high priority to generate growth.
At most points in the history of the hedge fund industry adding new strategies was a way for hedge funds management companies to grow. That leaves the most surprising choice – a third of hedge funds made “upgrading investment professionals” their top choice of a strategy for growth. Whilst it is quite feasible that the response means that headhunters are going to be very busy on behalf of hedge funds, it would be good to infer that training programmes for incumbent staff are going to be stepped up to compete better.