Ospraies Flagship Hedge Fund to Close - Mergers, Acquisitions, Venture Capital, Hedge Funds -- DealBook - New York Times

Ospraies Flagship Hedge Fund to Close - Mergers, Acquisitions, Venture Capital, Hedge Funds -- DealBook - New York Times: "The hedge fund manager Ospraie Management will close its flagship fund after it fell 27 percent in August on losses in energy, mining and natural resources equity holdings, in one of the biggest ever closures of a commodities-focused hedge fund.

The closure of the fund, announced Tuesday by the firm’s founder, Dwight Anderson, in a letter to investors, could be more bad news for Lehman Brothers Holdings, which took a 20 percent stake in the hedge fund manager in 2005.

“This is just adding to the fire for commodity-related names,” Peter Holst, managing director at Delta Global Advisors in Southern California, told Reuters. “Even this morning when the market opened, some of the names that Ospraie has positions in were getting hammered.”

In the letter, Ospraie Management said it planned to distribute 40 percent of Ospraie Fund’s assets to investors by Sept. 30 and an additional 40 percent by year-end. The remaining 20 percent of the fund’s assets are mostly illiquid and could take up to three years to give back to investors, it said."

Helge: I'll explain later why I blogged about this.