The Long-Short

As 2024 draws to a close, the Long Short team delivers its annual year in review episode. Hosts Tom Kehoe and Drew Nicol unpack a transformative year marked by seismic political shifts, groundbreaking legal victories for the alternative investment industry, and the resurgence of key markets like crypto and APAC. Joining them is AIMA CEO Jack Inglis, who shares insights from a whirlwind year of advocacy and engagement, plus what’s next for private markets and hedge funds in 2025.

On this episode of The Long-Short, we dive into the resurgence of Portable Alpha. Once a go-to strategy for institutional investors like pension funds and endowments, it became a cautionary tale after the 2008 financial crisis. Now, nearly two decades later, it’s back in the spotlight. What’s driving its revival? How has the strategy evolved, and why are investors rekindling their interest? This week Anne-Marie Fink, CIO, Private Markets & Funds Alpha at the State of Wisconsin Investment Board and Co-Chair of the AIMA Global Investor Board, unpacks the past, present and future of Portable Alpha.

This week, Daniel Austin, Head of US Markets Policy and Regulation, and Joe Engelhard, Head of Private Credit and Asset Management Policy, Americas, join The Long-Short from Washington to give their initial reaction on how the Trump Administration will impact the private funds industry.

In this episode of The Long-Short, we dive into the often-overlooked world of smaller and emerging hedge funds. While 75% of global hedge funds manage less than $500m in assets, these entrepreneurial managers are rarely highlighted in mainstream media, which tends to focus on multi-billion-dollar firms.For nearly a decade, AIMA has tracked the growth and challenges of this sector, and our latest report, Standing Strong: The 2024 Emerging Manager Survey, offers fresh insights into everything from the costs of running a hedge fund to the milestones firms must hit on their way to becoming billion-dollar managers. Joining us to discuss these key findings is Lawrence Obertelli, Head of EMEA Prime Services Sales at Marex Prime Solutions, and a long-time contributor to AIMA’s research on start-up hedge funds.

The growth in private markets has exploded over the past decade to a record $13 trillion AUM and the runaway growth shows no signs of stopping. As such, the asset class is under increasing scrutiny from a variety of stakeholders, including investors, governments, and the media. Leon Sinclair, Executive Vice President at Preqin joins The Long-Short team to discuss all of this, and how better data will shape the future of private markets and its role in the broader investment landscape.

Today’s episode of The Long-Short explores the current state of the hedge fund industry, examining which hedge fund strategies have thrived and which have faced challenges this year. The Long-Short host Tom Kehoe is joined by Roark Stahler, the US head of strategic consulting at Barclays Capital Solutions to discuss hedge funds' market influence, crowded trades, and their impact on key markets like currencies and commodities. Plus, insights on the hedge fund launch pipeline and what to expect as we close out the year.

What happens when a court strikes down a US SEC rule? What's next on the SEC’s agenda for asset managers? And how are AIMA’s key legal challenges evolving? The Long-Short returns from its summer hiatus to answer these questions and more as host Tom Kehoe is joined by Daniel Austin, Head of US Markets Policy and Regulation at AIMA, to dissect the most recent regulatory storms sweeping through the US asset management industry, examine what lies ahead for the US SEC in the lead-up to the US elections, and provide crucial updates on AIMA’s ongoing legal challenges that could reshape the regulatory landscape.

Fresh from his appearance at AIMA’s annual ESG conference, the Long Short team was delighted to sit down with The Rt Hon Chris Skidmore, former Minister for Energy and Chair of the UK Net Zero review. Skidmore offers his thoughts on the new labour government and how private investment can play a critical part to combat climate change.