The Austral Equity (onshore) Event Driven Fund returned +0.92% for November to take year-to-date performance to +0.84%, and +13.44% annualised since inception in 1997.
Austral was one of the first managers to move broadly into cash at the beginning of 2008, and as such was spared much of the carnage that has occurred in equity markets since that time. However the manager changed the position in November, dropping cash from over 95% to under 45%, investing mainly in interest rate securities. Long equity exposure remains low at 4.6%.
Meanwhile the manager announced that due to the high level of redemptions in the Opportunities Fund (domiciled in the Caymans) they had recently sold all securities, moving to 100% cash, with capital being returned to investors by 12 December. This was another case where redemption pressure on investors was the overriding issue rather than performance as the fund in Australian dollar terms was positive year-to-date.
