PAAMCO sets up seeding platform for emerging hedge funds

Alternatives specialist PAAMCO has set up a new seeding platform, the PAAMCO Launchpad, for emerging hedge funds, with the Employees Retirement System of Texas (ERS) as its inaugural partner.

Both ERS and PAAMCO believe that the platform will help early stage alternatives managers with high growth potential reach institutional status. It will also help ERS expand on its $1 billion emerging manager programme, which ERS plans to make 10% of its externally managed investment portfolio. It is planned to seed the PAAMCO Launchpad with $3 billion in assets supporting emerging managers.

The staff for the PAAMCO Launchpad consists of Andrew Gitlin as CEO, who has 30 years’ experience in alternatives, with Panayiotis Lambropoulos, a portfolio manager at ERS, leading the ERS effort with responsibility for identifying and reviewing potential investment opportunities. Jeff Willardson, head of portfolio solutions for PAAMCO, will be in charge of manager due diligence for the platform. Andrew Gitlin commented: “We believe PAAMCO Launchpad offers an intriguing value proposition that can unlock the potentially superior performance and private equity-like benefits embedded in early-stage hedge fund investing. Additionally, the platform is designed to create a solid alignment of interests between our clients and PAAMCO Launchpad.”

Lambropoulos added that the newly-created model has the potential to be an industry standard for identifying and investing in emerging hedge fund managers.