Einhorn's Greenlight Hedge Fund Down 12% After February Loss
Einhorn's Main Greenlight Hedge Fund Drops 6.2% in February
(Bloomberg) -- David Einhorn’s main hedge fund at Greenlight Capital fell 6.2 percent in February, extending losses to 12.3 percent this year, according to a client update seen by Bloomberg.
The S&P 500 Index lost 3.7 percent in February including reinvested dividends, paring this year’s gains to 1.8 percent. The HFRX Global Hedge Fund Index, an early indicator of hedge fund performance, dropped 2 percent in the latest month and is up 0.4 percent this year.
Jonathan Gasthalter, an external spokesman for New York-based Greenlight, didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the results.
Einhorn said on a conference call last week that his hedge fund was experiencing its worst underperformance ever after it dropped 6.6 percent in January. He compared the episode to March 2000, when the stock market returned close to 10 percent but the Greenlight fund remained flat. The following month, Einhorn’s contrarian bet began to pay off, and the firm made money while the tech bubble burst.
“While the environment has remained difficult with growth stocks accelerating their outperformance against value stocks this year including February, we think a reversion may finally be coming soon,” he told shareholders of Greenlight Capital Re Ltd., a reinsurer that relies on Einhorn for investments.
Four in five of Greenlight’s largest disclosed long positions as of Dec. 31 fell during the first two months of the year. Brighthouse Financial Inc. and General Motors Co. dropped 7.5 percent and 4 percent, respectively, through February. Meanwhile, companies Greenlight has said it’s shorting have posted gains despite a dip in the stock market in early February; Amazon.com Inc. is up 29 percent this year, while Netflix Inc. has jumped almost 52 percent.
To contact the reporter on this story: Simone Foxman in New York at sfoxman4@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Margaret Collins at mcollins45@bloomberg.net, Josh Friedman, Dan Reichl
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