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German to English: Fondskommentar - Vorsicht vor Wunderheilern
Source text - German Fondskommentar
Vorsicht vor Wunderheilern
Ernüchternd, aber wahr: In Crash-Zeiten helfen auch die von der Finanzindustrie als Allzweckwaffen gepriesenen Hegdefonds Privatanlegern nur bedingt weiter.
Der Verkauf von Finanzprodukten funktioniert über Angst und Gier. Meist weiß der Anleger noch gar nicht, dass er von einem der beiden Gefühle beherrscht wird. Also muss der Berater nachhelfen. Er spricht von Rendite, die der Anleger verschenken würde, und von Vermögensklassen, die sein Depot unempfindlicher gegenüber Finanzkrisen machten. Spätestens dann fällt das magische Wort Hedgefonds, das Begehrlichkeiten wecken soll.
Sie sollen weniger schwanken als Aktien und gleichzeitig renditestärker als Anleihen sein. Wie ein Impfstoff sollen sie das Depot gegen alle Seuchen der Finanzmärkte immun machen – gegen faule Kredite, einen steigenden Ölpreis und eine lahmende Konjunktur.
Jetzt, da die Finanzkrise in die nächste Runde geht, zeigt sich aber, dass die Hedgefonds nicht Problemlöser, sondern Teil des Problems sind. So musste die Citigroup kürzlich sechs ihrer Hegdefonds mit einer Finanzspritze von insgesamt einer Milliarde Dollar stützen, weil die sich mit US-Kommunalobligationen verzockt hatten. Die britische Hedgefonds-Gesellschaft Peleton Partners schloss ihren zwei Milliarden schweren Peleton ABS Master Fund, der sich mit verbrieften Krediten (Asset Backed Securities) übernommen hat. Bisher galten Hegdefonds als die cleveren Leichenfledderer, die alles billig einsammelten, was institutionelle Anleger in Notverkäufen auf den Markt werfen mussten, zum Beispiel Finanzwerte oder Hypothekenanleihen. Nun zeigt sich, dass sie die gleichen Fehler machen wie alle anderen Marktteilnehmer. Wie sollen sich Hedgefonds dann vom allgemeinen Markttrend abkoppeln, so wie es die Produktbroschüren versprechen? Die Statistik spricht jedenfalls gegen die Abkopplungsthese. Im guten Aktienjahr 2006 legte der HFRX Global Hedge Fund Index um 6,4 Prozent zu, in diesem Jahr ist er mit 1,8 Prozent im Minus (in Euro gerechnet). Hedgefonds glätten im Durchschnitt also nur den Trend.
Was die Rendite betrifft, sind sie auch keine echte Alternative zu sicheren Anleihen. Über die vergangenen drei Jahre gerechnet, legte der Index im Schnitt lediglich um 3,1 Prozent zu. Das wäre mit einer Bundesanleihe locker zu schaffen gewesen. Sicher haben einige Hedgefonds mit der richtigen Strategie mehr als die mageren 3,1 Prozent abgeworfen. Nur: Wie sollen Anleger den richtigen finden, wenn sich die Manager so ungern in die Karten schauen lassen? Gut, sie könnten die Auswahl Profis überlassen. Aber die in Deutschland angebotenen Dach-Hegdefonds, die so etwas tun, sind einfach zu leistungsschwach. Das geben selbst die Hedgefonds-Lobbyisten zu.
Translation - English Investment Fund Commentary
Don't Bet on Miracles
It is a sobering truth: during economic downturns, the hedge funds that are held up by the financial industry as all-around "miracle cures" for private investors, will only help you to a very limited degree.
The sale of financial products operates on fear and greed. Usually, the investor only knows - to a limited degree - that he or she is being influenced by one or the other of those two basic human emotions. This is where a financial advisor can help. A financial advisor can tell the investor about investment yield opportunities that the investor might otherwise not even know exist, and about asset classes that the investor can use to shield his or her portfolio from the effects of financial crises. Probably early on in the conversation, the financial advisor will mention that "magic" word: "hedge funds". And at that point, the investor will usually become very interested, and want to know more.
Hedge funds are designed to fluctuate less than stocks in price, and at the same time, provide better yields than bonds. Hedge funds are set up to make investment portfolios "immune" against all kinds of financial market contagions, such as risks stemming from bad credit on the books of banks and other financial institutions, the rising price of oil, and recession.
But now that the current financial crisis is entering its next phase, hedge funds have shown themselves to be more a part of the problem than part of the solution. Citigroup recently had to bail out six of its hedge funds with a financial injection of a total of a billion U.S. dollars, because the funds had lost money by, in essence, gambling on US municipal bonds. The British hedge fund firm Peleton Partners was forced to shut down its two-billion dollar Peleton ABS Master Fund, after that fund had overextended itself with asset-backed securities. Hedge funds have been called intelligent "vulture funds", that strip assets and buy up assets on the cheap, that institutional investors had to dump on the market in emergency sales, for example: stocks and mortgage debt. Now they are showing that they are also capable of making the same mistakes that all other market participants make. So how are the hedge funds supposed to be able to de-couple themselves from general market trends, which is exactly what their prospectuses promise ? The statistics show that they cannot decouple themselves as claimed. In 2006, which was a good year for stocks, the HFRX Global Hedge Fund Index rose by 6.4 %, but this year, it actually fell by 1.8 % (measured in euros). The only thing that hedge funds can really do is smooth out or soften the general market trend, a bit.
In terms of yields, they are not a real alternative to bonds, which are safer. If we look at the past three years, the Index has only risen by 3.1 % on average. And a government bond can easily provide a yield at that level. Of course, some hedge funds have yielded more than a meagre 3.1 %, by employing the right investment strategy. But the question still has to be asked: How can the individual investor find the right fund, when the fund managers are so hesitant about letting anyone look at the "cards" they are holding ? Ok, you could just leave it to the experts at the end of the day. However, the umbrella funds (funds made up of other hedge funds) that are sold in Germany, which supposedly do that, just do not perform well enough. And even the hedge fund boosters admit that.
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Other - Universität Mainz, Germersheim
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Years of experience: 32. Registered at ProZ.com: Apr 2010.
I am an American translator for German to English. I have been involved with German translation since 1992, when I was a student at the Universität Mainz, Germersheim (I earned my translation degree in 1996). I worked for 11 years for SAP AG, in Germany and the USA, and I lived in Germany for over 8 years.
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