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March was marked by investor scepticism over the Trump administration as proposed healthcare reforms to replace Obama's Affordable Care Act did not meet intended outcomes. This led to an overall cautious sentiment in the market over the administration's ability to deliver reforms in other sectors as promised during Trump's campaign. Aside from developments in the White House, the Fed has delivered on market expectations by raising the interest rate in March though the pace of interest rate hike remains largely unchanged at an average of three rate hikes for the year. Outside of the US, the triggering of Article 50 has kick-started the official Brexit process. Strength in the Eurozone inflation rate has also propped up expectations of tightening from the ECB, which could see a convergence of monetary policy outlook for the world's major central banks in the next 12 months.

Below are the key highlights for the month of March 2017:

• Hedge funds gained 0.34% in March with underlying markets, as represented by the MSCI AC World Index (Local) up 0.79% over the same period. On a year-to-date basis, managers gained 2.29% while underlying markets were up 5.06%.

• Among developed mandates, European hedge funds were up 0.73%, followed by North American peers with 0.48%. On the other hand, Japanese counterparts retracted 0.74% for the month. On a year-to-date basis, European managers reported 2.12% gains followed by North American and Japanese managers who posted returns of 2.10% and 1.15% respectively.

• Distressed debt hedge fund managers posted the steepest decline this month, down 1.21% followed by CTA/managed futures and macro mandated hedge funds which retracted 0.77% and 0.18% respectively over the same period.

• Emerging market mandates were up a modest 0.60% for the month with strength led by underlying Asia ex-Japan mandates. Frontier markets, as represented by the Eurekahedge Frontier Markets Hedge Fund Index is up 1.50% for the month.

• The Eurekahedge Long Short Equities Hedge Fund Index gained 1.07% during the month with strength led by underlying equity long-bias hedge funds which gained 1.51% over the same period. Long/short equities managers outshone other strategic mandates to post the best Q1 2017 returns, with gains of 3.87%.

• Asia ex-Japan mandated hedge funds outshone regional peers, gaining 1.57% during the month. Underlying Greater China and India hedge fund managers up 1.82% and 4.36% over the same period respectively. On a year-to-date basis, Greater China and India mandated hedge funds posted impressive gains, up 6.87% and 11.27% respectively.

• Among volatility-focused hedge funds, short volatility hedge funds topped the table for March, gaining 1.43% while long-volatility hedge funds posted the steepest decline, down 2.02%. On a year-to-date basis, short volatility hedge funds gained 3.38% while tail risk hedge funds were down 4.74%.