Wall Street fell out of love with equity hedge funds
FT News Briefing
Forhecz Topher
4.4 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 13 February 2024
⏱️ 12 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
US law firm Latham & Watkins is cutting off automatic access to its international databases for its Hong Kong-based lawyers, one of the oldest and best-known hedge fund strategies has suffered nearly $150bn in client withdrawals over the past five years, and the price of bitcoin touched $50,000 for the first time since 2021. Plus, the FT’s Kaye Wiggins explains how a Chinese financier is turning small businesses into a data gold mine.
Mentioned in this podcast:
Latham & Watkins cuts off its Hong Kong lawyers from international databases
Decline of the star stockpicker: investors pull $150bn from equity hedge funds
Bitcoin price touches $50,000 after spot ETF launches spur demand
The financier turning China’s noodle joints and karaoke bars into a data gold mine
The FT News Briefing is produced by Fiona Symon, Sonja Hutson, Kasia Broussalian and Marc Filippino. Additional help by Sam Giovinco, Peter Barber, Michael Lello, David da Silva and Gavin Kallmann. Our engineer is Monica Lopez. Topher Forhecz is the FT’s executive producer. The FT’s global head of audio is Cheryl Brumley. The show’s theme song is by Metaphor Music.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | The UK's energy partner. |
| 0:06.0 | Learn more at equinore. |
| 0:08.0 | At Aquinore. |
| 0:10.0 | UK. Good morning from the Financial Times. Today is Tuesday, February 13th, and this is your |
| 0:16.6 | FT news briefing. Companies in Hong Kong are feeling the pinch from Beijing's crackdown and equity hedge funds are losing their shine. |
| 0:27.2 | Plus China is kind of known as a black box when it comes to understanding the country's economy, one company could change all that. |
| 0:35.2 | This is kind of a treasure trove of information about how ordinary Chinese consumers are spending |
| 0:41.0 | their money. I'm Mark Filipino and here's the news you need to start your day. |
| 0:47.0 | Beijing has been cracking down on Hong Kong a lot lately and global firms are |
| 0:59.3 | worried about what this crackdown means for their businesses. |
| 1:03.3 | Take for example Latham and Watkins. |
| 1:05.8 | It's the world's second highest-grossing law firm |
| 1:08.8 | and it told its lawyers in Hong Kong |
| 1:11.2 | they can no longer automatically access its international database. |
| 1:15.2 | They're going to have to ask for special permission first. Now this type of |
| 1:19.6 | behavior is part of a larger pattern of how companies are doing business in Hong Kong these days, |
| 1:25.0 | which is a real problem for the city, |
| 1:28.0 | especially since it's made a name for itself as an international finance hub. |
| 1:33.0 | The best stock pickers from equity hedge funds used to be treated like financial royalty. |
| 1:44.8 | For years, the managers using the so-called long-short strategy made big bucks in U.S. markets. |
| 1:52.3 | But lately, the strategy hasn't really been working out, |
| 1:56.0 | and investors are losing patience. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Forhecz Topher, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Forhecz Topher and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.