Tate Gallery lost £1m on hedge funds last year

Finance | Gareth Jones | 12 Jan 2010

The Tate Gallery responded to 2008’s market turmoil by completely eliminating its exposure to hedge funds, having previously held 23 per cent of its allocation in this class.

The Gallery held £6.3m in hedge funds at 31 March 2008, but converted them into cash after they lost 13 per cent of their value, more than £800,000.

It sold its hedge fund investments for £5.2m, resulting in an overall loss of £1.1m over the course of the financial year.

At year ending 31 March 2009, the market value of the Gallery’s investments was £16.1m, down £10.5m on a starting figure of £26.6m.

The Tate’s hedge fund allocation was managed by TriAlpha Fund Managers, but has now terminated its relationship. Its other fund manager, Coutts, continues to manage a mixture of bonds and equities.

The charity’s chair, Paul Myners, resigned in October 2008 to become the government’s financial services secretary. He, along with fellow trustee Franck Petitgas, has a background in hedge funds.

The Gallery’s investment policy was put under review in the autumn of 2008, with an investment committee formed and a revised investment policy put in place last year.

Directory: Tate Gallery

Comments

[Cancel] | Reply to:

Name *

Email *

Organisation

Job Title

Comments *

Verification *

* Please read our Community Standards

Close »

Community Standards

The civilsociety.co.uk community and comments board is intended as a platform for informed and civilised debate.

We hope to encourage a broad range of views, however, there are standards that we expect commentators to uphold. We reserve the right to delete or amend any comments that do not adhere to these standards.

We welcome:

Robust but respectful debate
Strongly held opinions
Intelligent relevant discussion
The sharing of relevant experiences
New participants

We will not publish:

Rude, threatening, offensive, obscene or abusive language, or links to such material
Links to commercial organisations or spam postings. The comments board is not an advertising platform
The posting of contact details for yourself or others
Comments intended for malicious purpose or mindless abuse
Comments purporting to be from another person or organisation under false pretences
Gratuitous criticism, commentary or self-promotion
Any material which breaches copyright or privacy laws, or could be considered libellous
The use of the comments board for the pursuit or extension of personal disputes

Be aware:

Views expressed on the comments board are left at users’ discretion and are in no way views held or supported by Civil Society Media
Comments left by others may not be accurate, do not rely on them as fact
You may be misunderstood - sarcasm and humour can easily be taken out of context, try to be clear

Please:

Enjoy the opportunity to express your opinion and respect the right of others to express theirs
Confine your remarks to issues rather than personalities

Together we can keep our community a polite, respectful and intelligent platform for discussion.