the variance between funds in the same strategy is very high, so the indices don't necessarily make great samples i would think.
With the sample size involved, sampling error (even with high population variance) is low enough that we know the great majority of funds must be in the red this year. And actually, variance isn't as high as you'd think, as correlation in fund returns have gone up quite a bit over the past few years. And speaking as someone who observes the population directly (by following many individual managers numbers), I *know* that's the case.
It's an idle observation, not related to the indices. I follow the HSBC HF Performance weekly stats and, because it groups funds by strategy and then averages the numbers across groups, Paulson's number does horrible things to all the averages.
I can understand George Soros very much. Jesus, how did he handle it more than 30 years? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Maybe his $100million salary was what he did it for? Let's face it..he would not have made billions day trading from his kitchen table. So maybe, just maybe, it was worth the "hassel"?
Whaaaat? Icahn did 31% last year and I believe his was the only large fund above 30%. You must be a pro.
Just saw this. I read a report that showed within a strategy, hedge fund manager account for a good percentage of the return variance. I can find the paper and email it to you if you are interested. It was from a fund of funds so it might be a little biased. In any case, hedge fund manager volatility is higher than mutual fund manager volatility. Not surprised that the correlations are going up.