Iraqi Babylon Fund Maintains Calm in June

So far this summer, with only some slight exaggeration, Iraq could comparatively be portrayed as a stable, safe & secure place, according to the Fact Sheet for June 2008 for the Iraqi Babylon Fund.

Relative calmness characterized Babylon Fund's performance in June, mainly trading sideway with a modest 0.6% performance in the red at closing. Most of the fund's sectors, asset classes and portfolio holdings experienced calm waters, except for the internationally traded oil companies whose volatility increased significantly.

The overall portfolio strategy has allowed the Iraqi fund to stay in positive territory through the year, with a +1.7% performance on a YTD basis. In anticipation of increased riskadjusted returns on the medium-term we continue to add to our Iraqi

The Babylon Fund is an open-ended mutual fund investing into large-cap Iraqi-dependant securities, mainly listed on the Iraqi stock exchange in Baghdad, but also in other countries.

Asia's 5 Largest Single-Manager Hedge Funds

Asia-based funds are getting bigger according to Alpa Magazine. Several of the funds on the list are relative newcomers and five members of the Asia 25 ranking were not on the list last year.

The 25 largest funds in Asia collectively had $52.2 billion in assets as of March 31, up from $35.5 billion a year earlier and $22.6 billion at the start of 2006.

Tokyo-headquartered Sparx Group Co. ranks No. 1 on the Alpha 2008 Asia Hedge Fund 25 for the second year in a row, with $8.1 billion in assets under management. Hong Kong-based Value Partners, which controls $5.9 billion, is No. 2 again, also retaining its 2007 ranking. Singapore's Artradis Fund Management climbs from eighth to third by almost quadrupling its size, to $4.7 billion. And although Singapore-based Arisaig Partners slipped from third to fourth, it nearly doubled its assets under management, to $4.3 billion.

Sparx's lead is precarious. The company is in negotiations to sell a majority stake in its $3 billion Seoul-based Cosmo Investment Management Co., a move that would drop it into second place behind Value Partners and only slightly ahead of Artradis.