Women Hedge Fund Managers Made More Money than Men in 2013

New data has shown that female hedge fund managers have made more money for their clients than their male counterparts over the last year.

According to professional services firm Rothstein Kass, which tracked the industry from 1 January 2013 through to the end of November, global hedge funds that are run by women provided a 9.8% return to clients while the HFRX Global Hedge Fund index was up only 6.13%.

"There have been studies that show that testosterone can make men less sensitive to risk-reward signals, and that comes through in this study," said Meredith Jones, a director at Rothstein Kass.

"There have been studies that show that testosterone can make men less sensitive to risk-reward signals, and that comes through in this study.

"Raising money is difficult for anyone regardless of whether you are wearing Louboutin pumps or loafers."

Rothstein Kass's Women in Alternative Investments Index, which includes 80 of the world's 125 women-run hedge funds, also showed that from January 2007 through June 2013 women produced a 6% return for hedge fund investors on average, compared with a 1.1% loss at the HFRX Global Fund Index.

While the data fuels speculation that women are better investors, hedge funds run by women manage only a tiny fraction of the broader industry's $2.5tn (£1.5tn, €1.8tn).

The most well-known female-run hedge funds include Valerie Malter's Matarin Capital Management, Jamie Zimmerman's Litespeed Management, and Meridee Moore's Watershed Asset Management.

Meanwhile the survey in the Rothstein Kass report also found that a majority of female hedge fund managers are aiming to deliver double-digit profits in 2014 and that 17.5% of respondents, which are not currently running a fund, said they wanted to do so within the next five years.

However, roughly 93% of the investors polled said that they have no specified mandate to invest in women-owned or -managed funds but this is mainly because of a "lack of supply" of women-owned or -managed funds.

The lion's share of investors, 73.5%, said that it anticipates that
their allocations to women-owned or -managed funds will
remain the same in 2014.

However, 24.5% expect allocations to increase somewhat, and 2% expect allocations to women-owned or -managed funds to
increase significantly.