While the hedge fund industry recovered during 2009, new fund launches were still behind that of the previous year, with total assets raised considerably lower than the total raised during 2008.
Calculating the same way as our global surveys of previous years, where we focused on funds with assets of $50 million or more, the number of new funds for last year was down only slightly, with 139 funds launched compared to 149 funds during 2008. But the combined assets for new funds launched fell by 35% from $40 billion in 2008 to just over $26 billion for last year.
The US and UK once again dominated, which is evident from the fact that all but one fund in the top 25 new fund launches are managed from one of these two locations. Despite the constant talk of tighter regulation and moves to less regulated areas, the UK remained in...