Hedge Fund and Insider Trading News: Bill Ackman, Leon Cooperman, George Soros, Starboard Value LP, Lone Pine Capital, Lynx Asset Management, TransDigm Group Incorporated (TDG), Enstar Group Ltd. (ESGR), and More

BlackRock-Soros Feud Is a Microcosm of Wall Street’s China Dilemma (The Wall Street Journal)
Talk about a Wall Street showdown. George Soros is battling it out with Larry Fink over investing in China. The world’s largest money manager, BlackRock , has raised around $1 billion for a mutual fund for Chinese individuals, the first and only foreign firm allowed to do so in the country. More may soon follow suit. The country’s growing middle class offers largely untapped opportunities for foreign investment-management firms. BlackRock’s internal think tank also recommended in August that global investors boost exposure to China.

The Bill Ackman SPAC Debacle is the Perfect Example of What Happens When a Market Bubble Meets a Star Investor’s Hubris (Business Insider)
Bill Ackman should say nothing, not one word, until he finds a fix for his stunning tone deafness. The famous, swashbuckling investor can afford to find a good one. Ackman’s hedge fund, Pershing Square Capital, made over $2.5 billion in less than two weeks by betting on the market chaos of March 2020. That may have been his fastest billion, but it certainly was not his first.

Box Prevails in Fight with Starboard Over Board Seats-Sources (Reuters)
Sept 9 (Reuters) – Box Inc (BOX.N) is poised to win a proxy contest against Starboard Value after the cloud services provider’s shareholders backed all three board directors that the hedge fund was challenging, people familiar with the matter said on Thursday. The sources cautioned that it was possible that the outcome could still change when Box’s annual shareholder meeting is convened later on Thursday. They asked not to be identified because the matter is confidential.

Fintech Start-Up Varo Bank Triples Valuation to $2.5 Billion After Gaining Bank Charter (CNBC)
Varo Bank has more than tripled its valuation after gaining a national banking charter last year, CNBC has learned. The company is set to announce Thursday that it raised $510 million in a Series E round led by hedge fund Lone Pine Capital and including dozens of new and existing investors. The firm’s valuation rose to $2.5 billion from approximately $700 million after its previous fundraising, according to people with knowledge of the matter.

China Quant Hedge Funds Under Scrutiny as Stock Turnover Jumps (Bloomberg)
Chinese officials are stepping up scrutiny of quantitative trading after the securities regulator warned against possible problems caused by computer-driven transactions. Regulators consulted some top quant funds this week about the potential impact of trading on the market, people with knowledge of the matter said. Similar communications have taken place previously and regulators haven’t requested any curbs on fund size or trading frequency as of now, the people added, asking not to be named because the discussions are private.

The Tide is Turning (Hedge Nordic)
Stockholm (HedgeNordic) – Trend-followers as a group experienced a challenging asset-raising environment in recent years. The tide is turning this year. According to eVestment, CTA trend-followers and other managed futures funds enjoyed net inflows in six out of the first seven months of this year. Swedish quant firm Lynx Asset Management, which manages the oldest running hedge fund in Sweden – systematic trend-following fund Lynx, has also attracted strong capital flows this year.

Hedge Funds Surge into Double-Digit Territory After August Rebound (Hedge Week)
Hedge funds’ narrow rise during August has driven their year-to-date returns back into double-digit territory, as equity long/short, event driven, macro and relative value managers all scored gains in the face of the Afghanistan crisis, ongoing monetary policy uncertainty, and Covid’s continued impact on markets. Hedge Fund Research’s main Fund Weighted Composite Index – a broad-based index tracking the monthly returns of some 1400 single manager hedge funds across all strategy types – rose 0.80 per cent last month.

UK Buyout Boom: 2021 Shaping up to Be a Record Year (Preqin)
With Brexit and pandemic concerns in the rear-view mirror, favorable valuations are likely to help sustain the boom in buyout deals in the UK. Confidence is returning to the UK buyout market. While the shock Brexit vote in 2016 cast uncertainty over UK equity markets as investors grappled with the potential implications for corporates, the agreed deal and the UK’s official departure at the end of 2020 have since helped to ease concerns. This and successful vaccination roll-outs have facilitated strong buyout deal activity this year. Looking at the drivers behind the boom suggests it could continue for some time yet.

Billionaire Investor Leon Cooperman Says If You Don’t Understand Bitcoin, You’re Old – and if You’re Nervous About the World, Gold is a Better Store of Value (Business Insider)
Billionaire investor Leon Cooperman told CNBC that people who don’t understand bitcoin are likely to be old, and said gold is a better store of value for those looking for a stable haven for their cash. The Omega Advisors chairman noted that while veteran investor Barry Diller sees cryptocurrencies as a “con job,” he doesn’t know whether they are. Instead, he admits that he is in the dark about the digital assets.

Thursday 9/9 Insider Buying Report: TDG, NMTR (Nasdaq.com)
On Tuesday, TransDigm Group’s Chief Financial Officer, Michael Lisman, made a $502,515 buy of TDG, purchasing 850 shares at a cost of $591.19 a piece. Bargain hunters can pick up TDG at a price even lower than Lisman did, with the stock trading as low as $581.03 at last check today — that’s 1.7% below Lisman’s purchase price. TransDigm Group is trading up about 0.3% on the day Thursday. This purchase marks the first one filed by Lisman in the past year. And at 9 Meters Biopharma, there was insider buying on Tuesday, by Director Mark A. Sirgo who purchased 73,529 shares for a cost of $1.36 each, for a total investment of $99,999. Before this latest buy, Sirgo bought NMTR at 2 other times during the past twelve months, for a total investment of $123,864 at an average of $0.71 per share. 9 Meters Biopharma is trading trading flat on the day Thursday. Investors have the opportunity to buy NMTR even cheaper than Sirgo did, with the stock trading as low as $1.31 in trading on Thursday — that’s 3.7% below Sirgo’s purchase price.

A Director at Enstar Group (NASDAQ: ESGR) is Buying Shares (Analyst Ratings)
Yesterday, a Director at Enstar Group (ESGR), Robert J. Campbell, bought shares of ESGR for $447.8K. Following Robert J. Campbell’s last ESGR Buy transaction on August 27, 2018, the stock climbed by 15.4%. This is Campbell’s first transaction since reporting a Buy transaction on AGFS back in December 2018. The company has a one-year high of $269.12 and a one-year low of $148.56. Currently, Enstar Group has an average volume of 62.75K. ESGR’s market cap is $4.18 billion and the company has a P/E ratio of 2.50.

Capital One – Capital One Financial Insider Trades $1.88 Million In Company Stock (FinTech Zoom)
Capital One – Capital One Financial Insider Trades $1.88 Million In Company Stock. Frank Lapradeiii, Chief Enterprise Srvcs Officer at Capital One Financial (NYSE:COF), made a large insider sell on September 2, according to a new SEC filing. What Happened: A Form 4 filing from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday showed that Lapradeiii sold 11,668 shares of Capital One Financial at a price of $161.81 per share. The total transaction amounted to $1,881,384. They still own a total of 45,400 of Capital One Financial worth, $7,022,926.