In November, renewed activity on the stock market, illustrated by a level of implied volatility that was slightly up (23.5 per cent) on the previous month but with no significant change since July, resulted in a flat trend for the S&P 500 index, which managed to avoid losses (+0.01 per cent).

Conversely, the fixed income market failed to maintain profitability as the Lehman Global Bond index registered an unusual loss of 0.70 per cent, according to figures from Edhec Risk.

After two months of strong progress, convertible bonds (-1.89 per cent) withdrew noticeably and, after two months of stability, regular bonds (-1.22 per cent) recorded their most severe loss since last December.

Although it slowed down, the commodities market remained on the rise (+2.07 per cent) for a third consecutive month. After its low point of last month, the dollar benefited from a remarkable rebound (+3.72 per cent).

Harmed by both the poor performance of convertible bonds and a shrinking credit spread (-0.21 per cent), the convertible arbitrage strategy ended its five-month climb with a moderate loss (-0.26 per cent) but remained the best-performing strategy over the year.

Hampered by the fall-off in regular bonds and the rise of the dollar, the CTA global strategy registered a noticeable loss (-2.17 per cent) despite the profits on the commodities market.

The event driven strategy scored moderately (+0.34 per cent), between a receding merger arbitrage strategy (-0.23 per cent) and, considering the shrinking credit spread, an unexpectedly profitable distressed securities strategy (+0.72 per cent).

Equity market neutral managed a third consecutive month of modest gains (+0.47 per cent) as the long/short equity strategy performed slightly better (+0.76 per cent).

Overall, the fund of fund strategy remained stable (-0.02 per cent), and nearly on a par with the stock market.