RBC Capital Markets has reported that for the month of March 2009 the RBC Hedge 250 Index had a net return of 0.46 per cent.

RBC Capital Markets has reported that for the month of March 2009 the RBC Hedge 250 Index had a net return of 0.46 per cent.

This brings the year-to-date return of the index to 0.75 per cent.

Convertible arbitrage returned 6.36 per cent, while fixed income arbitrage and equity market neutral returned 1.26 per cent and 0.27 per cent respectively.

Equity long/short and macro were also in positive territory, returning 0.71 per cent and 1.48 per cent respectively, but managed futures returned -2.24 per cent.

In the event driven sector, credit returned -0.15 per cent and mergers and special situations returned 0.57 per cent.

Multi-strategy returned 0.44 per cent.

The returns are estimated and will be finalised by the middle of next month.

The return for February 2009 has been finalised at -0.96 per cent.

The RBC Hedge 250 Index is an investable benchmark of the performance of the hedge fund industry.

Since its inception on 1 July 2005 through the end of February 2009, the RBC Hedge 250 Index has had an annualized net return of 0.06 per cent. In comparison, over the same period, other investable indices have averaged -3.28 per cent while non-investable indices have averaged 2.20 per cent, according to information reported by the sponsors of those indices.