FERI wins coveted innovation award from the renowned The Hedge Fund Journal

The BTV AM Alternative Investments Fund (ISIN: DE000A3D06L2) initiated by the Austrian Bank für Tirol und Vorarlberg AG (BTV) and managed by FERI AG has won the UCITS Hedge Award 2024 of the renowned The Hedge Fund Journal “ in the category ‘Best New Launch’ in the Fund of Funds - Liquid Alternative Investments segment. Launched in June 2023, the fund of hedge funds bundles a broadly diversified portfolio of absolute return funds that FERI put together exclusively for BTV. When selecting managers, the FERI hedge fund team can draw on its extensive experience and expertise in both the offshore and UCITS hedge fund universe. Only liquid alternatives with a UCITS product wrapper are used for BTV AM Alternative Investments. “Our multi-manager approach integrates a variety of investment styles, including systematic approaches such as volatility strategies, alternative risk premia and the search for market inefficiencies. This allows us to offer investors a broad range of alternative sources of return,” says Dr. Thomas Maier, Head of Hedge Funds at FERI.

The BTV AM Alternative Investments Fund currently comprises ten funds that invest in the five sub-strategies Relative Value, Equity Hedge, Tactical Trading, Event-Driven and Protection. When selecting suitable candidate funds, the focus is on the following criteria: low correlation to traditional investments, sustainable yield generation, a stable and experienced management team, transparent reporting and communication as well as favorable conditions.

BTV is currently using the fund exclusively in its existing asset management mandates. “With BTV AM Alternative Investments, we are aiming to reduce volatility in the overall portfolio through broader diversification and to offer our corporate, family office and private customers additional, independent sources of return alongside equities, bonds and commodities,” explains Dr. Robert Wiesner, Head of Asset Management at Bank für Tirol und Vorarlberg AG. The bank manages around EUR 2.73 billion in various mandates comprising equities, bonds and alternative investments. 

Award for innovative competence in the hedge fund sector

With the award from The Hedge Fund Journal, FERI's more than 20 years of expertise in the selection and development of innovative investment solutions in the alternatives sector has received further recognition. “We are delighted to receive this award, which underlines FERI's innovative expertise and the relevance of alternative investments for our company and our clients. We would also like to thank BTV for the fact that this innovative investment concept developed exclusively for them can also be made available to other FERI clients in the future,” says Dr. Marcel V. Lähn, Board Member and Chief Investment Officer at FERI. “The fund represents another important building block in the area of alternative investments in our multi-asset investment approach. This underlines the expertise and experience we have built up in the hedge fund segment since 1999, which we are continuously expanding and improving,” adds Lähn. As a discretionary asset manager, FERI invests in traditional offshore hedge funds and also in UCITS hedge funds. FERI has the largest German-speaking hedge fund research team in Germany and continuously monitors a universe of around 600 alternative UCITS funds and several thousand traditional offshore hedge funds. To do this, FERI's experts draw on their own internal proprietary database and third-party databases as well as a global industry network.