Seth Klarman's Baupost Group To Return Cash

[ExpectedValue]

This is pretty interesting but it makes sense. To me, it must be really difficult for him to find opportunities with $23B in AUM. Even if he went 50% cash, he would still have to deploy more than $10B which is a real feat right now.

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/seth-klarman-baupost-group-to-return-capital-2010-11

 

-Seth Klarman's Baupost Group will return 5% of its capital to investors at the end of the year

 

-Baupost has generated an monstrous $6.5 billion in net investment profits from January 1, 2009 to September 2010

 

-This growth has propelled the firm to an enormous $23 billion in assets.

 

[scorpioncapital]

Unless it continues, I don't see how returning $1 billion out of $23 billion is going to solve the problem.

[StubbleJumper]

Well, shedding $1B out of $23B AUM might not seem like much, but at the margin, it's pretty significant.  Suppose Klarman has enough great ideas to soak up $5B, a collection of very good ideas that soak up another $5b, and some okay ideas for another $5B.  If that were the case, he'd have about $8B too much capital which would probably be left in treasuries or something.  Dumping $1B of that $8B of surplus capital would actually take a pretty large bite out of his problem.

 

Not sure just how few ideas he has and how large his surplus really is, but...

 

 

SJ

[ExpectedValue]

Unless it continues, I don't see how returning $1 billion out of $23 billion is going to solve the problem.

 

The way I figure it, sometimes Klarman goes to 50% cash when he doesn't see many opportunities. In that case, the 5% becomes 10% which when you are getting in the billions is pretty significant. So maybe he is trying to put a soft cap on his assets.

[Guest]

According to the Schoder interview:

 

"Berkshire has put 60% of its cash flow into equities so far this year. It’s an increase from zero, which could easily be interpreted as a portfolio repositioning, but it is not. Warren is still building cash. He doesn’t like bonds right now, but he likes cash. The feeling of needing to be fully invested obstructs a lot of money managers."

 

So, Buffett is building up cash and Klarman is spending money back to shareholders. Something to consider.

[ExpectedValue]

Buffett can afford to sit on larger amounts of cash than Klarman though, because Berkshire can go out and swallow entire businesses (Burlington Northern).

[rijk]

 

klarman raised 12 billion only three months after he returned 5 billion to investors???? so what happened after not seeing many opportunities only 3 months ago, looks like klarman is getting ready to take advantage of a huge opportunity......

 

http://boston.citybizlist.com/7/2011/2/24/Seth-Klarman%E2%80%99s-The-Baupost-Group-has-Raised-12B-for-its-Hedge-Funds--cbl.aspx

[CR]

Read the article a bit closer. That $12B is a sum of all of the amounts his funds have initially raised since inception in 1983.

 

The article mentions nothing about raising money in the last 3 months.

[rijk]

ok, thanks for the clarification, strange article,... doesn't seem to have any other purpose than to mention a huge value and baupost/klarman.......

 

regards,

rijk