The Dow Jones Credit Suisse Hedge Fund Index posted its largest monthly gain since April and finished up 1.73% in October.

Equity and credit based strategies such as long/short equity, emerging markets, event driven, and distressed were some of the top performers in October. However, the strategies remain in negative territory year-to-date.

Tactical trading managers showed a bifurcation in performance as global macro managers posted positive performance while, on the purely systematic side, managed futures funds posted negative performance, largely due to losses from trend-following models.

On the relative value front, fixed income arbitrage managers posted a small gain despite the volatile interest-rate environment while convertible arbitrage and multi-strategy managers benefited in part from their equity and credit components.