Brevan Howard Set for Best Month Since 2020 After Trump Rally

(Bloomberg) -- Brevan Howard Asset Management, billionaire Alan Howard’s investment firm, is having its best month since the early days of the Covid pandemic, reaping hundreds of millions of dollars on bets linked to the election of Donald Trump as US president.

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The $12 billion Brevan Howard Master Fund gained 6.1% this month through Nov. 15, which will be its strongest performance since March 2020 if returns remain steady, according to documents seen by Bloomberg News. That works out to an estimate of roughly $700 million after fees, according to Bloomberg calculations.

Much of the gains have come from bets on foreign exchange, including wagers that the euro would fall against the US dollar, US stocks and volatility trades, people familiar with the matter said.

The euro has tumbled to its lowest against the greenback in more than a year since Trump was elected earlier this month while US stocks hit a record high, part of a rally that generated massive gains for some investors. Rokos Capital Management, the hedge fund started by former Brevan Howard trader and co-founder Chris Rokos, made almost $1 billion on the day after the vote, Bloomberg News has reported.

A spokesperson for Brevan Howard declined to comment.

The gains may help Jersey, Channel Islands-based Brevan Howard turn around its performance after a muted period. The flagship Master Fund returned just 0.1% for the year through October, compared with a 5.8% increase for the Bloomberg Macro Hedge Fund Index, the documents show.

The Master Fund had one of its worst months on record in February, losing about 3% after bets on US interest rates backfired, Bloomberg News reported at the time. In the months that followed, the firm fired 10% of its traders and shuttered funds run by star managers Alfredo Saitta and Louis Basger. Saitta has since left the company.

Brevan Howard is one of the world’s most vaunted so-called macro hedge funds that try to profit from bets on interest rates and currencies. Howard helped to found the firm after leaving Credit Suisse in the early 2000s and the Master Fund has since made more than $19 billion of profit, Bloomberg News reported earlier this year.

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