Baring Asset Management (BAM) is considering offering structured notes referenced to Baring Hedge Select Fund. "It's on the drawing board," said Tom Maier, head of BAM's alternative investment team in London. The asset manager is still ascertaining demand for the notes and Maier said it is too early to estimate the potential size, structure or timeframe. The firm is talking to several investment banks about structuring products on the USD100 million fund, noted Maier, declining to name the firms.
The Baring Hedge Select Fund is one of BAM's three fund-of-hedge-fund strategies. The other two include a closed fund, which is managed for an institutional client, and the recently-launched Asian fund of hedge funds. Baring Hedge Fund Select has 22 managers which fall into five categories, including convertible arbitrage, fixed-income relative value, hedged equity, global macro and merger arbitrage, Maier said. It has an annualized return of roughly 9.7% since its inception in 1999, Maier added.
