New fund of hedge funds management group SilverStreet Capital has received FSA approval and has already been awarded a mandate of over USD 500 million from a European institution.

New fund of hedge funds management group SilverStreet Capital has received FSA approval and has already been awarded a mandate of over USD 500 million from a European institution.

SilverStreet Capital is a partnership set up by Gary Vaughan-Smith and Alex Da Costa to manage institutional hedge fund assets. The duo were key players in the development of the Alternatives business at ABN AMRO Asset Management. Vaughan-Smith headed the team and assets under management grew from under USD 50m from when he joined in 2001 to a multi-billion business when the duo left in the summer of 2006.

'We are delighted to have been awarded this mandate from a blue-chip European institution and to start the business at a significant size. Both Alex and l look forward to building a substantial, institutional quality fund of hedge funds business as we were able to do at ABN AMRO', says Gary Vaughan-Smith, Partner at SilverStreet Capital.

'In the fund of hedge fund world we bring real investment experience, institutional quality management and a track record of building a business,' adds Alex Da Costa, Partner at SilverStreet Capital.
SilverStreet Capital will have an institutional focus. 'Our aim is to build a world-class investment management firm delivering outstanding risk-adjusted returns to our clients,' comments Gary Vaughan-Smith. 'In our previous roles, we were instrumental in bringing hedge funds to new markets across Europe and Asia. There is a healthy appetite for alternative investments from institutional investors in particular, and we see many years of continued inflows into Alternatives from this source.

Gary Vaughan-Smith is a founding partner of SilverStreet Capital. Between 2001 and 2006 he was Head of the Alternative Investment Group at ABN AMRO Asset Management responsible for all hedge funds and funds of hedge products.

Between 1990 and 2001 Gary was at Gartmore Investments Ltd, initially heading the Quantitative Investment and Risk Consultancy teams.  In 1998 he became Head of the Global Portfolio Team, responsible for some USD26bn in assets under management.

Alex Da Costa is a founding partner of SilverStreet Capital. Most recently, Alex was Head of Portfolio Construction in the Alternative Investment Group of ABN AMRO Asset Management where he worked from December 2002 and 2006.

Alex started his career in the hedge fund industry in 1999 at Vector Asset Management (UK) Ltd.

SilverStreet Capital is authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. The investment products and services of SilverStreet Capital are only available to intermediate customers and market counterparties; they are not available to private customers.