The retail potential for hedge fund UCITS is huge, but Dublin-based Merrion Investment Managers is not initially focusing on that area.
Merrion decided to launch a hedge fund, the High Alpha Fund, three years ago. Kevin Gallacher, director of Merrion, the hedge fund returned more than 100% in a negative market environment.
It is the success of this fund that resulted in Merrion wanting to expand outside of the domestic market in Ireland with new alternative investment products aimed at the UK and European markets, which has around €1 billion ($1.3 billion) in total assets under management.
He says: “Given that there are thousands of traditional hedge funds out there, we believe that the growing popularity of UCITS provides us with an opportunity to establish a presence in the market fairly quickly.”
The Merrion European Absolute Return Fund is its first UCITS hedge fund and was launched in April...