Horlick jumps on hedge fund bandwagon

So called ‘superwoman’ Nicola Horlick, is rumoured to be planning a $1.8 billion floatation of her Bramdean Asset Management group, which was set up only last year.

Horlick, was branded ‘superwoman’ by the scurrilous tabloids that promote ‘tat’ on a daily basis to mainly illiterate hoards in the UK. Whilst denigrating council estate mothers for having more than their ‘allowance’ of 2.4 children and leaving them in the charge of carers, the papers go on to lavish praise on twice married multi-millionairess Horlick who has five children and leaves them at home in the charge of carers.

The rumors – surely not part of a clever labor government style ‘leak and see’ type approach – indicate that Horlick intends to raise at least $470 million in new money on AIM from rich investors prepared to invest a ‘few thousand’ to test the volatile hedge-fund market.

Hedge funds are highly risky instruments (see previous article) that have come under the spotlight recently with the spectacular collapse of the Amaranth group which bet heavily on Gas prices and managed to lose more than $5.5 billion due to leveraged losses from one trader.

Horlick is understood to be spreading the risk by investing in other hedge funds rather than managing a hedge fund directly herself – creating a ‘fund of funds’. Of course this means that potential upside will be averaged out so gains are likely to be less spectacular. The HFRI fund-weighted index has only made a return of 6.9 percent this year compared to a gain of 11 percent from the FTSE 100.