Austral Capital's Equity Fund gained +0.74% in January, building on solid returns in late 2008 and bringing its 2009 financial year return to +3.66%.

The Fund remained heavily invested in cash for the month (46.5%), and continued only to hold or increase existing interest rate securities positions (CBA Perls 11, Macquarie Airports Tickets). The manager elected to maintain a low exposure to the market due to ongoing global volatility in the face of bank nationalisations and the threat of deflation, and regulatory uncertainty (particularly regarding the short selling ban).

The Attunga Enviro Opportunities Fund (EOF) recorded a strong positive return in January due to an increased demand for electricity during the month, up +11.12%.

Record high temperatures in Melbourne and Adelaide during January sharply increased electricity demand, with the Victorian spot contract jumping from $47.25/MWh to $75/MWh in the space of a week. The manager also noted the return of some volatility to power markets during the month.

Attunga's other fund, the Agricultural Trading Fund, was also up in January (+4.98%). There was a slight recovery in agricultural commodity prices from lows in early December, with the fund benefitting from cross commodity and volatility spreads.

Goldman Sachs JBWere's Multi-Strategy Fund was closed on February 2, after freezing applications and redemptions in late November. The Fund is a fund of hedge funds, which offers Australian and New Zealand investors exposure to a variety of underlying managers and strategies.

Liquidity has proven to be a problem for fund of hedge funds in recent times, particularly due to the slide in the Australian dollar and in cases where the fund offers monthly liquidity however the underlying funds only allow quarterly or longer redemptions. Several other fund of hedge funds, including the BT Global Return Fund, Select Gottex Market Neutral Fund, HFA's Diversified and Octane Funds, DWS Strategic Value Fund and the Credit Suisse/Tremont Index Strategies Fund were also forced to freeze redemptions in late 2008.

As widely expected the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) reduced official interest rates by a further 100 basis points to 3.25% as a response to the global economic crisis.

The full text of the Board's media release follows:

'At its meeting today, the Board decided to reduce the cash rate by a further 100 basis points, to 3.25 per cent, effective 4 February 2009.

There was a significant deterioration in world economic conditions late in 2008. The effects on household and business confidence of the financial turmoil following Lehman’s collapse, and continuing strains on major financial institutions, saw a significant downturn in demand around the world. As a result, the major advanced economies contracted sharply in the December quarter, as did a number of emerging market economies. The Chinese economy, though still growing, has slowed markedly. Global inflation, having reached high rates during the middle of 2008, is now declining.

Measures to stabilise financial systems have contributed to an improvement in the functioning of credit markets over the past couple of months. This, in conjunction with expansionary macroeconomic policy measures being taken around the world, should assist in promoting global recovery over time. But the near-term outlook for the global economy is the weakest for many years.

Economic conditions in Australia have also been affected, though less than in other advanced economies. Australia’s financial system remains in a strong condition and large interest rate reductions over recent months have been passed through in substantial measure to end borrowers. Nonetheless, the combination of last year’s financial turmoil, a severe global downturn and substantial falls in commodity prices has had a significant dampening effect on confidence, and therefore on prospects for growth in demand. Inflation has begun to moderate and, given recent developments, it is likely to continue to decline.

In these circumstances, the Board judged that a further sizable reduction in the cash rate was appropriate, to give further support to demand. In making its decision, the Board took into account the package of measures announced by the Government earlier today. The combination of expansionary monetary and fiscal policies now in place will help to cushion the Australian economy from the contractionary forces coming from abroad.'

The Wingate Global Equity Income Fund was down -0.62% in December and -18.70% in 2008, despite a healthy +20% return in realised income from the fund's investment process.

Share price declines were the main factor contributing to the negative 2008 return, with unprecedented drops in equity prices hurting the fund particularly in the last quarter of the year. During the December quarter the fund continued to decrease its cash position in favour of a higher equity exposure, with the heaviest weighting in the oil and gas industry (approximately 25% of the fund's assets), a sector which suffered from a drop in the demand for oil and lower investment in new production in 2008.

Given the uncertain outlook for world economies in 2009, the fund will continue with a company specific focus, rather than position itself for a general recovery in consumer or financial conditions.

The AMP Capital Total Return Fund returned -6.50% in December, capping off a disappointing year for the fund (down -33.17% after fees).

During December the fund brought its leverage back to around 1.2x, as per its stated goals for the last quarter of 2008, negatively impacting performance. Although painful, the manager believes this will enable the fund to better exploit future opportunities. Negative performance in the energy and materials sector also contributed to the December result, although the fund did see positive returns from many of its equity and relative value strategies. Ongoing volatility and lack of demand and liquidity in credit markets remained the salient factors in market conditions.

Tibra Capital's Market Neutal Fund was down -0.51% in December, however was up +4.86% overall in 2008.

The minor fall in Australian equity markets in December (the S&P/ASX200 was down 13 points, from 3672 to 3659) saw small movements in stock prices in all sectors the fund was invested in. Following the lifting of the blanket short selling ban in November the fund recommenced shorting individual stocks, in lieu of of a short index position. Long positions on materials and short positions in industrial stocks were key drivers of the December result.

The Tibra Capital Market Neutral Fund adopts a quantitative market netural investment strategy, identifying relative price opportunities in major equity markets.

Antipodean Capital Management's Global Volatility Arbitrage Strategy ended 2008 with a return of +3.22% in December and +17.34% YTD.

The strategy, which uses a stochastic volatility model to identify investment opportunities from a basket of equity and FX assets, attributed the positive December result to buying Equity S&P500 (VIX) put options.

Antipodean's other absolute return funds, the Diversified CTA Strategy and the A$ Currency Strategy (3x), returned +2.03% and -0.04% respectively in December.

Australia's financial services regulator, ASIC, has extended the ban on covered short sales of financial stocks until March 6th, 2009. The ban, which was due to be lifted on 27th January, was extended due to renewed volatility in financial stocks in the US and Europe.

ASIC's decision will no doubt please some, and disappoint others, including those investors who have sold stock ahead of the expected lifting of the ban and in anticipation of further price weakness. However, the renewed volatility in bank and financial stock prices overseas has probably had more to do with additional and continuing bad news in the sector than the resumption of short selling.

In their statement released on 21 January, ASIC said:

'ASIC today said it would keep the ban on covered short selling of financial securities in place until Friday, 6 March 2009.

ASIC advised the market on 13 November 2008 that the current ban on covered short selling of financial securities (as defined in ASIC’s release of 13 November 2008) would remain in place until at least 27 January 2009.

This approach was consistent with many other jurisdictions, including the UK, where the Financial Services Authority (FSA) planned to lift its short selling ban on certain financial securities on 16 January 2009.

The FSA lifted its ban on 16 January 2009 and ASIC expected to then lift its ban, so as to be in line with the other major markets.

ASIC, however, noted the recent increase in volatility in financial stocks in overseas markets. ASIC is not at this stage in a position to assess if the resumption of short selling in the UK was coincidental or contributed to this volatility and if so, to what extent.

As many factors are at play in these overseas markets, ASIC needs time to examine these latest developments. ASIC will therefore, over the next few weeks, assess the markets more carefully to determine the role of short selling and aggressive or predatory practices and whether there are similar risks for Australia when the ban is lifted.

ASIC believes that in the context of the renewed volatility affecting banking stocks in many markets, including the UK and USA, this cautious approach is warranted. ASIC believes that any possible loss of market efficiency or price discovery as a result of this additional short period of review is therefore justified.

ASIC’s decision to extend the ban on covered short selling of financial securities is also in the context of a legislative framework that recognises short selling as a legitimate mechanism of price discovery and liquidity, subject to disclosure and subject to intervention by ASIC in exceptional cases.

ASIC’s intention is and remains to keep its intervention to an absolute minimum. ASIC will continue its consultations with relevant stakeholders and other regulators in Australia and overseas.

ASIC will keep the position under review, and might decide it has sufficient information to be able to lift the ban earlier than 6 March, and will make a decision for 6 March closer to that date.'

TechInvest's Intercept Capital Fund reported a gain of +0.76% in December (+12.0% in 2008), outperforming the its benchmark (the UBS Australia Bank Bill Index) which returned +0.45% over the same period (+7.6% in 2008).

With markets firmer in December, positive returns were generated from both long (Accenture Ltd, MicroStrategy Inc) and short (Dell Inc) positions, as were negative returns (FTI Consulting, Apple, Satyam). December also saw the reintroduction of short sales, with 14 stocks being shorted during the month.

The Intercept Capital Fund is a long/short (market-neutral) fund that invests in global equities, diversified across up to 40 companies.