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Seeded by Lee Ainslie's Maverick Capital and backed by the infrastructure of Trium Capital, experienced long/short manager Selvan Masil's nascent hedge fund boutique has got off to a strong start with its focus on high-conviction, long-term fundamental stock-picking - and expects to gain from global investors' renewed appetite for exposure to European equities
Westray Capital Management, a London-based European equity start-up established early last year by Selvan Masil, is off to an auspicious start - returning 19.8% net in its first year of trading, and securing an early-stage seed investment from well-known US hedge fund firm Maverick Capital.
The Westray Long/Short Fund, a fundamental bottom-up strategy that has a long bias but also emphasises high-conviction shorting, launched in June 2014 and gained 7.5% in the second half of last year against a backdrop of relatively flat European equity markets.
It went on to make 9.04% in the first six months of 2015, comfortably ahead of a 6.8% gain for the EuroHedge European Equity EUR Index. Since launch, the fund is annualising so far at almost 16%, with a volatility of 8%.
Masil has 15 years of capital markets and asset management experience, including a decade in European long/short equity. After several years in investment banking - first at Merrill Lynch and then Lexicon Partners (now Evercore) - he moved over to the buy side in 2004 when he joined Lansdowne Partners as an analyst, spending four years with the multi-billion dollar long/short firm and covering a range of sectors for the firm's European equity strategy.
Whilst at Lansdowne he worked with Ross Turner, who later left the firm to establish Pelham Capital Management - which has also grown into one of London's largest long/short equity firms. Masil rejoined Turner at Pelham in 2008, as a partner and senior analyst.
In 2010 he made the move to Theorema Advisors as a portfolio manager, where he subsequently ran his own carve-out portfolio within the firm's European equity hedge fund.
Masil left Theorema in January 2014 to set up his own operation and, after assessing various options, found a home for his new venture at Trium Capital.
Trium has not allocated seed capital to the Westray fund, but provides the start-up with back and middle-office functions including...