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Hedge Fund Managers' Vernacular

As there is a considerable amount of industry-specific jargon used in Hedge Fund Managers’ monthly reports, please see the below glossary to explain some of the more arcane terminology.

* Challenging conditions = double-digit down month

* Cautiously optimistic = single-digit down month

* Constrained risk profile = we bottled it at the bottom

* Alpha = imaginary friends

* Beta = punting

* Alternative Beta = punting in stuff we can’t spell

* Negative gamma = we lost money, but it wasn’t our fault

* Positive gamma = we lost money, but it wasn’t our fault

* Theta/Kappa = our research department has been on a junket

* Negative correlation = everyone else made money

* Prudent cut in leverage = we went to Antigua for our holidays

* Liquidity issues = “Thank-you for calling XYZ International Capital Markets. Unfortunately all our sales operatives are receiving their P45s at present. Your call is important to us, so please try again later, perhaps if there is ever another bull market in this rubbish…”

* Re-optimised portfolio = we threw out the baby, bathwater and the bath

* With hindsight… = ouch

* Healthy growth in AUM = how bad must the opposition be?

* Modest outflows = they wanted to redeem the lot, but our small print is world-class

* Material outflows = would anyone like to re-invest in my new minicab venture?