Van Hedge Launches New Tracker Index

by Carla Johnson, Investors Offshore, London

18 February 2003

Van Hedge Fund Advisors has launched the Van Tracker Index (VTI), an 18-constituent portfolio index which Van says will be useful for pension funds and other fund managers in building funds to track the global hedge fund universe.

“In 2003, we plan to work on promulgating its use worldwide and are interested in exploring its use with potential distributors, institutional investors and other potential users, including producers of index derivative products,” said George Van, chairman of Van Hedge Fund Advisors.

The Van Tracker Index has 18 constituent strategies and sub-strategies, and since it was created last year had been tracking the established Van Hedge Fund Index with a high degree of correlation. The Van Hedge Fund Index, produced monthly, originally represented the industry's first benchmarking information based on a very large and representative sample. The Index shows returns monthly, by sector and style, for US hedge funds and Offshore funds separately, and also combined as a Global Index. The Company's database, which is used in construction of the Index, contains detailed information on over 3,400 hedge funds (2,000 US and 1,400 offshore). These funds represent about $182 billion of assets.

George Van says he believes the VTI represents the ideal index for building investable products by institutions, individuals, and funds of funds. “Because the VTI can be shown to represent the hedge fund universe,” he explained, “institutions such as pension funds, foundations and endowments can choose to use it to build their core hedge fund product.”

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