After two months of gains, albeit only 0.01 per cent in January, the UCITS Alternative Index Global recorded a loss of 0.18 per cent in March to leave it at 0.14 per cent for the year.PARA_BREAK_SENTINEL_9f8e7d6c

After two months of gains, albeit only 0.01 per cent in January, the UCITS Alternative Index Global recorded a loss of 0.18 per cent in March to leave it at 0.14 per cent for the year. Overall it was a fairly muted month for UCITS hedge funds. The best performing sub-index, by a factor of ten, was emerging markets, recording gains of 1.97 per cent to leave it down 0.49 per cent YTD. FX, event-driven and fixed income were the only other strategies to record gains of 0.19 per cent, 0.15 per cent and 0.08 per cent respectively. Event driven funds have been slow and steady in 2011 and are now up 1.40 per cent for the year. Looking at the March laggards, CTA and macro funds came out on top, recording losses of 1.47 per cent and 0.79 per cent. The CTA index is the worst performing sub-index so far this year, down 0.89 per cent. The commodities sub-index, although down slightly (0.07 per cent) in March, has the biggest gains for the first three months of 2011, up 3.47 per cent. The biggest month-on-month swing was seen in emerging markets, reversing February’s 1.47 per cent loss.