Another hedge fund firm is shutting down in what is becoming something of a trend.
New York–based Newland Capital Management closed its hedge fund at the end of last year and is returning all client money by the end of this month, according to people with knowledge of the firm. The firm’s hedge fund had just $100 million under management at the time of the closure but managed about $1.25 billion at its peak.
The fund had received a rash of redemption requests and had fallen more than 10 percent last year after being flat in 2014, according to one person with knowledge of the situation. Newland specialized in industrial stocks, which did not do well last year.
The firm was founded in 2007 by Kenneth Brodkowitz and Michael Vermut, who had both previously worked for Balyasny Asset Management. Brodkowitz was a partner and portfolio manager at Chicago-based Balyasny. Earlier he was a head trader and portfolio manager at Raj Rajaratnam’s Galleon Group and worked for five years at investment bank Goldman Sachs. Vermut was a partner and portfolio manager at Balyasny. Before that he was a senior analyst at Harvest Capital Management and spent two years at Blackstone Group.
Newland is the latest hedge fund closure in recent weeks and months. Others include Fortress Investment Group’s Fortress Macro Funds, Renaissance Technologies’ Renaissance Institutional Futures Fund (RIFF), BlueCrest Capital Management (which is returning outside capital in all of its funds), Seneca Capital Investments and Nevsky Capital, to name just a few.
