Liquid alternatives limped out of 2015, their performance dragged down by losses in all the sub-strategies.
The Wilshire Liquid Alternatives Index recorded a 2% loss in December, and finished the year down 3.5%.
This was in line with the 3.6% negative performance of the HFRI Global Hedge Fund Index, but way off the 0.9% loss produced by HFRI's fund-weighted index.
The S&P 500 Index ended the year up 1.4%, and the Barclays US Aggregate Bond Index up 0.6%.
All the liquid alternatives sub-strategies recorded losing performance in 2015: equity hedge, down 5.1%; event-driven, down 4.1%; global macro, down 3%; multi-strategy, down 3%; and relative value, down 2.9%.
Wilshire reported that the liquid alternatives universe comprises 565 funds, with total assets under management of $324 billion. Of these, 199 are equity strategy funds, 124 multi-strategy, 105 relative value, 97 global macro and 40 event-driven.
