New real estate long/short fund up 8.5% YTD by capitalising on mispriced securities Benedicte Gravrand, Opalesque Geneva Rick Murray

Midwest Advisors, a new asset manager located in St. Louis, Missouri, was founded by Rick Murray, an ex-manager at Hovde Capital Advisors LLC, who wanted to capitalize on 15 years of experience analyzing and investing in real estate sector equities.

“I founded my firm in 2013 after spending six years at another long/short equity hedge fund manager that was focused on financial services and real estate,” he tells Opalesque. “The timing was such that I had the opportunity to pursue my entrepreneurial ambitions and start my own firm.”

Midwest now manages three traditional strategies and two alternative strategies – both long/short equity. The biggest one is the Dynamic Opportunities Portfolio; a $4m managed account which invests in the real estate sector, including REITs, REOCs, homebuilders, developers, residential and commercial construction companies, and real estate services companies. The portfolio, which was launched in January 2013, is up 8.5% YTD (net), and is listed in Opalesque's EManagers database.

“The strategy is a real estate sector focused long/short strategy investing in public equities,” Murray explains. “The investment philosophy is deep value on the long side where we are looking for very out-of-favor and mispriced securities where we believe we have an informational advantage to bring to bear, and in the form of very detailed fundamental analysis whereby we derive our own estimate of the companies' net asset value. From there we are able to determine the degr......................

To view our full article please login

This article was published in Opalesque's New Managers a top-down monthly analysis, news and research publication on the global emerging manager space.