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Platform and Industry updates
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06/11/2024
Artificial Intelligence Increasingly Important for Private Fund Managers’ Middle and Back Office
Artificial intelligence (AI) has long been deployed by asset managers in their investment strategy, particularly those that invest in and trade the public equity markets. The sheer volume of price history alone, for example, lends itself well to a technology that can analyse and determine patterns in minutes, as opposed to the weeks it would take a human to perform the same task.
Until the past few years, spending money on AI technology in the middle and back office has been less of a focus for asset managers. After all, it’s the less ‘sexy’ part of the business and has historically played second fiddle to the ‘rockstars’ of the front office.
That’s changing, however. And for a few reasons.
First is the continued fee compression seen in the private markets. As more firms and funds launch, competition increases, driving down costs - classic demand and supply forces. Asset managers need to find ways to lower their own costs so that they can deploy more capital (or maintain the spend) into the investment function. AI is a perfect use case for this; automating tasks previously done manually and speeding up other processes, both of which can save money.
Second is the ‘FOMO’ (fear of missing out) created by the recent explosion in the use of generative content tools like ChatGPT. These tools – which are improving seemingly by the week – can support an asset management firm with producing investor letters and notifying the appropriate people about any potential cybersecurity issues, are just two of many use cases for this technology.
Third is the increasing regulatory burden placed on asset managers in the market. Costs in the compliance function continue to increase due to the ever longer reach of the regulators. These costs aren’t purely hard currency costs; the time costs of compliance impact investment firms here as well. AI can save time and money supporting the compliance function, whether internal or outsourced, with both analysis and reporting.
Fourth is in trade reconciliation. While this is more specific to hedge funds than illiquid private fund categories, the recent move to T+1 settlement in the United States, Canada and Mexico has placed even more emphasis on the need for swift trade matching, and AI’s ability to analyse extensive data sets in order to match trades accurately is a clear use case here.
These themes are all medium to long term, structural trends, which are not going away. A quote often attributed to Bill Gates goes something like this: “If your business is not on the internet, then your business will be out of business.” The asset management version of this would seemingly be,
“If your asset management business is not using AI in the middle and back office, your asset management business will be out of business.”
AI is already an established tool for the portfolio manager to effectively implement their investment strategy. Now, it’s an essential tool for the middle and back office, too.Editor's Picks:
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05/08/2024
The Importance of Getting In at the Start for Hedge Fund Technology Service Providers
Despite the enormous amounts of money that they control, most hedge fund firms are ‘small’ companies: small in the sense of the number of people they employ.
And those that they do employ are busy. Not only is that because all small firms, regardless of industry, tend to exhibit more freneticism on a day-to-day basis than their larger counterparts; it’s because everyone, not just the investment professionals, are watching the markets alongside doing their actual job.
Certainly, they are usually too busy to proactively source new technology suppliers. Most hedge fund firms change their tech when something goes wrong with their existing one or prices rise to what they consider to be an unacceptable level. But they will tolerate price rises to a degree, and the odd glitch or display of poor customer support now and then, because changing providers requires not only sourcing a new one but onboarding it and learning a new system. There are no cost problems in business, only revenue ones, as the saying goes. Ergo, displacing tech competitors is difficult in hedge fund world.
That is why it’s important to get in at the beginning.
According to Form D data collected by 9AT, 299 hedge fund filings were submitted to the SEC in the first four months of this year. Of course, not all of those are emerging or start-up managers, so those existing firms launching new funds will have a tech infrastructure in place already. But plenty enough will be, and the data referenced here is only for the period January – April this year, which means eight more months of filings – and therefore, new hedge funds - coming to market in the remainder of 2024 for sales reps at tech firms to get excited about.
Of course, most of these new firms and funds will have used certain providers at a previous job and will already have their favorites. But it is also true that many of these firms will want to establish their own identity, taking a greenfield implementation approach to how they build their technology infrastructure. And they are often cost-conscious as well, meaning that firms with a more competitive price point have a better chance of success with the newer and emerging manager cohort.
And for firms that have technology that can be applied to many other silos in the alternative investment industry, there is an even larger audience to target. According to Form D data collected by 9AT, there were 998 Form D private equity filings in the first four months of this year, and 1,714 Form D venture capital filings, many more than in the hedge fund space.
There are, of course, many more hurdles for technology companies to negotiate on the route to new customer acquisition success. Tailoring the pitch to the fund’s strategy being one; back in the hedge fund space, it is well documented that equity hedge strategies comprise the preponderance of new launches overall, but not all of them will want the latest and greatest in public-equity related tech. And compliance being another – the SEC’s pending cybersecurity regulations for fund managers means that these firms will be more focused on whether new tech firms can reach a higher compliance bar.
Those hurdles are high – it’s not easy selling tech to a hedge fund. But those technology service providers that do get into new hedge fund firms at the ground level could, in time, enjoy the same competitive advantage that incumbent providers enjoy at the more established firms.
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04/10/2024
Just How Common is Changing Auditors for Private Funds?
The first quarter of the year is a busy one for Registered Investment Advisers: those with a financial year end of December 31st are required to file an updated Form ADV within 90 days, so for those watching the private fund industry, there is plenty of information that can be gleaned from looking at this data.
Plenty of firms look at the data to see which firms and their affiliated private funds have changed service providers. Of course, private funds and their advisers changing service providers is nothing new. A range of factors drive the decision; costs, quality of the offering and the customer service function, to name a few.
But one service provider change raises more eyebrows than any other: Auditors.
Reasons that a private fund might change auditors include those listed above. But a change of auditor may suggest potential accounting issues or a breakdown in trust between the fund and the previous auditor. Neither of those reasons receive a green check mark on a due diligence questionnaire and almost always call for a deeper dive by the investor (and can even be a cause for redemptions for those that are at the ‘very averse’ end of the risk spectrum).
So, it perhaps comes as a surprise that, according to data collected by 9AT by aggregating Form ADV filings in the US, 2,346 private funds changed audit firm in the year to March 31st, 2024.
That seems like a high number on the surface. But looking at that in percentage terms, there were 75,468 funds outstanding at the start of the period, so at a macro level, only 3.1% changed auditors.
The SEC splits funds into sub-categories and the manager selects what they think is the most appropriate label for their fund when they file. Figure 1 below shows the breakdown of the number and percentage of funds that changed auditor in the period April 1, 2023 – March 31, 2024, based on the SEC filing category.
Figure 1: Private Funds that changed auditor, April 1, 2023 – March 31, 2024
Fund Type
Number of Funds Changed
Total Number
%
Private Equity
874
13,745
6.4
Venture Capital
543
15,505
3.5
Hedge Fund
458
29,705
1.5
‘Other’
269
7,750
3.5
Real Estate
172
5,770
0.3
Securitized Asset
28
2,895
1.0
Liquidity
2
98
2.0
Source: 9AT
Whether the percentage figures above are high, low, or in the middle is a question for the individual, given its subjectivity.
It is perhaps little surprise which audit firms comprise the top five of the ‘competitor displacement’ table. Figure 2 below shows the top five firms, sorted by most to least, that have replaced a previous auditor. So, Deloitte has replaced the previous auditor most often overall; RSM has replaced the auditor most often in the private equity category, PwC in the real estate category, and so on.
Figure 2: Private Funds that changed auditor, April 1, 2023 – March 31, 2024, Ranked by Auditor and CategoryRank
Overall
Private Equity
Venture Capital
Hedge Fund
Other
Real Estate
Securitized Asset*
1
Deloitte
RSM
Frank, Rimerman & Co
Deloitte
Deloitte
PwC
Deloitte
2
KPMG
Grant Thornton
KPMG
KPMG
PwC
Grant Thornton
KPMG
3
PwC
PwC
Moss Adams
Richey May
Baker Tilly
EY
EY
4
RSM
KPMG
Deloitte
PwC
RSM
Citrin Cooperman
Weaver
5
EY
Deloitte
BDO
EY
Wolf & Co
RSM
Citrin Cooperman
Source: 9AT
Note: The Liquidity Funds category only had two auditor changes in its entirety the time period analyzed so was excluded from the table and analysis
* The Securitized Asset category saw only five audit firms complete a competitor displacement in the time period analyzed
Interestingly, we see non-Big Four audit firms take up a significant number of spots (14) in the top five across the six fund categories. Indeed, in the Private Equity category, which saw the most auditor changes both from an absolute and relative perspective, the top two, RSM and Grant Thornton, are non-Big Four. In the Venture Capital category, which saw the second most changes from an absolute perspective and relative perspective, two non-Big Four names (Frank, Rimerman & Co and Moss Adams) appear in the top three.
Changing auditors isn’t for the faint of heart; transitioning to a new auditor involves a lot of coordination and document exchange. This can disrupt internal processes and be a drain on resources, especially for smaller funds, so regardless of the fund category, those that decided to take the plunge in the past 12 months clearly had what they felt were compelling reasons to do so. And when they did, there wasn’t necessarily a beeline straight to the Big Four.Editor's Picks
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03/06/2024
How Well Do You Know Your Manager’s Service Providers?
Asset managers are spending more time and money on building out a more robust middle and back-office function than ever before. That’s partly because of regulatory changes, which make more demands of an asset manager from a compliance perspective. And it’s partly because they are realizing that this can provide a competitive advantage, helping them to differentiate themselves from their competitors and peers (as this article by Gen II Fund Services explains).
And it’s also partly because allocators / LPs are digging ever deeper into the nooks and crannies of an investment manager’s middle and back office as part of their decision-making process around an allocation.
The operational due diligence (ODD) effort of an investor was not always so intense. In years gone by, asset managers simply wanted to know that the manager had certain service providers in place – and that these providers existed. Less attention was paid to the ins and outs of the provider. Today, however, allocators / LPs want to know why a manager uses a specific service provider, what the terms of the agreements are, whether they have changed service providers, any conflicts of interest, and whether those service providers have been in the news in the past few years (in a good way or a bad way – but mostly bad).
Until recently, investors had to compile the information they wanted relating to their asset manager’s key service providers – auditors, custodians, prime brokers in the hedge fund space, and fund administrators – manually. But technology is helping them to not only maintain this data but get ahead of the curve in terms of the ODD process by analyzing the Form ADV data to help build a picture of an asset manager ahead of an ODD meeting.
Data collected by 9AT tracks more than 2,000 service providers to private fund advisers in the US. This enables an ODD person / team at a fund of funds, a pension plan, endowment, insurance company or foundation to ask better questions during the ODD meeting. They are using it to confirm that the service providers in the PPM are those on the Form ADV, and if not, asking what has changed; they can see if there has been a change in auditor over time, which many consider something of a red flag; they can ask why a smaller, newer manager may be using brand-name service providers, which are sometimes more costly, when a different provider will be sufficient; and they can even conduct their own risk analysis on service providers from a diversification point of view, in the sense that they may have too much exposure to a certain service provider if that provider is used by many of the investor’s underlying fund managers.
Portfolio analytics technology has been around for many years, allowing allocators and LPs to build a comprehensive picture of the underlying exposures of the private funds in their stable, in turn enabling their investment due diligence (IDD) function to identify areas where they have too much risk exposure, or not enough. Now, finally, technology is providing the ODD practitioners with better tools to support what is an increasingly important part of the overall due diligence effort, enabling them to not only be better at being reactive, but more importantly, be proactive.Editor's Picks
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02/07/2024
Plenty of Dry Powder Available for Real Estate, Venture Capital Deals if You Know Where To Look
Much of the news media coverage of the real estate market in the United States focuses on the challenges in the commercial space, as office block owners in non-prime locations face the double-whammy of higher interest rates impacting their ability to refinance, and falling rental incomes due to the persistence of the work from home culture that was borne out of the Covid-19 pandemic-induced lockdowns, increasing vacancy rates . It’s something that some industry commentators say will continue, even to the extent of clearing out the regional banks.
The same can’t be said for the residential market, however. Supply issues plague the space almost nationwide, and the average house price in the country is at a record high of $342,685, according to the Zillow Home Values Index, at the time of writing.
That represents a good opportunity for local and/or opportunistic real estate developers to build houses or multifamily buildings and turn a tidy profit. But finding sources of funding is often difficult – you have to know someone who knows someone in order to get access to financing, as local and regional banks aren’t as willing lenders as they once were.
But it doesn’t have to be difficult for entrepreneurs to find capital. According to data from 9at, there were 92 completely new Form D filings in the ‘real estate’ category in 2023, representing $6.74bn of capital. And many of these pooled investment vehicles that file form Ds have not yet made a first sale, so they are out raising money from investors, and when they do raise, that’s more money seeking deals.
Obviously, many of these funds are looking to do larger deals. But still, there’s plenty of investment dollars available for smaller developers looking to finance their project.
It’s a similar story for start-ups. In 2023, the venture capital industry took, in some ways, a worse hit than the commercial real estate market, with fundraising hitting a 6-year low. The troubles with Silicon Valley Bank in March last year added short term woes to more fundamental challenges faced by the private markets in terms of fundraising, as investors pivoted out of illiquid assets like venture capital and private equity to more liquid credit investments, buoyed by the comparatively higher yield and lower risk offered by these securities. But there’s another reality facing startups – the ‘new normal’ in the market is that venture capitalists are now being much tougher on due diligence and less flippant in terms of just throwing money at the next great idea.
Add to that, the fact that the capital raising environment is currently as friendly to the venture capitalists than any point since 2010, means that start-ups will need to cast a wider net than ever before in order to secure funding.
But that funding is out there. According to 9at data, there were 13,788 new form D venture capital funds filed last year, that had raised $246bn from their investors. That money will need to find a home at some point, unless the VCs decide to return uncommitted capital back to their LPs.
The reality facing start-ups is that they will need to contact many more potential investors than they did previously in order to secure an investment. And the reality facing real estate developers is that they will also need to be more pro-active when it comes to sourcing capital. But, as the Form D data shows, the money is out there.
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01/09/2024
Hedge Fund / Prime Broker Relationship Set for an Interesting 2024
According to Nasdaq eVestment, in 2023, investors pulled a total of $75bn from hedge funds through the end of November. And, according to HFR, the average hedge fund returned just +4.82% year-to-date through the end of November. In comparison, the S&P 500 returned approximately 24%.
Despite the overall redemptions, the back end of the year tends to be heavy in new Form D filings for hedge funds as the fund managers look to begin raising capital and trading at the start of the new year.
Time will tell whether a more stable macroeconomic and geopolitical climate will help or hinder hedge fund performance – and in turn, asset flows - this year, but one thing we’re interested to see is if and how the hedge fund / prime broker market will change this year.
A few developments could impact the space. The switch to T+1 settlement in the US will be flipped in May, which could lead to something of a shake-out in PB hedge fund customer rosters. Manual trade reconciliation processes, which worked fine in a T+2 regime, won’t in a T+1 world. and so hedge funds that don’t get their middle and back-office up-to-speed to help their PBs, may find themselves looking for a new prime. Additionally, the SEC has put the onus for compliance on the sell side, so a prime won’t hesitate to move on from a client that it thinks poses a potential risk.
But where one side of the hedge fund/PB coin sees the primes concerned about their hedge fund clients, the other side sees hedge funds concerned about the primes. An interesting report published by Acuiti at the end of October last year says that smaller hedge fund firms are concerned about consolidation in the FX prime brokerage market, with 43% of survey respondents saying that they were either quite or very unsatisfied with their FX PB options.
Emerging hedge funds already face an uphill battle in terms of building a sustainable business. The regulatory environment continues to get ever more burdensome, and it’s generally understood that assets continue to flow to the larger managers and funds more generally, making asset raising more difficult over time. Now, they face additional hurdles with their PB relationships.
The optimist, however, will say that all this creates opportunity for ‘challenger’ brands in the PB space. Some PBs with a lower risk appetite will likely be more aggressive in shedding clients, with others waiting in the wings to add these hedge fund firms to their client list. It also wouldn’t be a surprise to see more M&A in the space this year, consolidating the middle of the pack (in terms of size). Smaller hedge funds that still trade frequently will be coveted by challenger PBs, and this article that discusses the merits of a high-touch customer service offering by PBs may be a factor into which of the primes either moves up or cements its place in the upper end of the mid-tier bracket.
2024 is set to be as interesting a year as we’ve seen in a while for the hedge fund/prime broker market.
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