By Svea Herbst-Bayliss
BOSTON (Reuters) - Investment firm Tiger Global, known for making big bets on technology companies, told clients on Thursday that its hedge fund climbed 2.3 percent last month, helping shrink its year-to-date losses, a source familiar with the numbers said.
May's gain, fueled by stronger returns at some of its biggest holdings including Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX), Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) and Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL), helped shrink the fund's year-to-date loss to 18.1 percent, the source said.
A number of hedge funds posted stronger returns in May as some battered stocks recovered, helping them either shrink their year-to-date losses or erase them completely.
Despite May's gains, Tiger Global, which manages roughly $20 billion and has some $6 billion in its hedge fund, still ranks among the year's worst-performing funds, according to industry analysts, after its top tech holdings suffered heavy losses in early 2016.
The decline marks a rare misstep for the firm, which earned a 6.8 percent return in 2015, according to investors, when the average hedge fund lost money.
A regulatory filing showed that at the end of the first quarter, Tiger Global owned a small investment of 275,000 shares in LendingClub, the online platform that forced out its chief executive officer in early May after its board found evidence of falsified data on some loans.
The stock price tumbled last month, and it was not clear whether Tiger Global still held the position in May.
2016 has shaped up as the worst year since the financial crisis for hedge funds, with poor returns prompting investors to pull out roughly $17 billion in assets during the first quarter, eVestment data show.
Viking Global Investors, run by Andreas Halvorsen, had a strong May as its fund climbed 5.7 percent, shrinking its year-to-date loss to 2.8 percent, a person familiar with the number said. Some of its biggest holdings, including Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Inc and Amazon.com rebounded in May.
Fund manager Mark Kingdon also shrunk his year-to-date loss with a strong gain in May. The Kingdon Global Long/Short Equity fund climbed 5.24 percent last month, leaving it off 3.16 percent for the year, a person familiar with the numbers said.
Clint Carlson's Carlson Capital's flagship multi-strategy Double Black Diamond fund moved into the black in May.
The fund climbed 2.3 percent in the month and is up 1.24 percent for the year, a person familiar with the numbers said.
The firm's $1.1 billion equity long-short Black Diamond Thematic fund rose 3.64 percent in May, extending its year-to-date gains to 13.25 percent. Carlson Capital oversees $9 billion in assets.
Reade Griffith's Polygon European Equity Opportunity Fund, which manages $650 million, gained 2.3 percent in May, extending its year-to-date gain to 8.9 percent, a person who has seen the numbers said.
Renaissance Technologies, one of the world's most prominent hedge funds with roughly $27 billion in assets, posted small gains in its Renaissance Institutional Equities fund, known as RIEF, inching up 0.59 percent last month. For the year, the fund is up 8.74 percent.