INVITATION The WU Gutmann Center cordially invites you to the forthcoming WU GUTMANN CENTER PUBLIC LECTURE www.gutmann-center.at (apologies for duplicated mails!) **************************************************************************** Date: MARCH 22 (Thursday), 2012 - 4:00 pm Location: Bank Gutmann AG, Schwarzenbergplatz 16, 1010 Wien Speaker: Prof. Dr. ALEXANDER KEMPF, University of Cologne Title: THE VALUATION OF HEDGE FUNDS' EQUITY POSITIONS ABSTRACT: We provide evidence on the valuation of equity positions by hedge fund advisors. Reported valuations deviate from standard valuations based on closing prices from CRSP for roughly seven percent of the positions. These deviations are economically significant for about 25 percent of the hedge fund advisors. Advisors with more pronounced valuation deviations show a stronger discontinuity in their reported returns around zero, manage a higher fraction of potentially fraudulent funds, show smoother reported returns, self-report to commercial databases, and are domiciled in offshore locations. Additional tests suggest that the documented equity valuation deviations respond to past performance. ABOUT ALEXANDER KEMPF: Professor Kempf is Professor of Finance at the University of Cologne and a full member of the Northrhine-Westphalian Academy of Sciences, Humanities, and the Arts. He is in charge of the Cologne PhD School in Risk Management, is a member of the Executive Board of the Cologne Graduate School and the managing Director of the CFR Centre for Financial Research. The CFR is an independent research institute focusing on topics in asset management. Professor Kempf has been teaching at the University of Cologne since 1999. He obtained his doctoral degree and his venia legendi from the University of Mannheim. Professor Kempf has published extensively on asset and risk management. His current research focuses on mutual and hedge funds as well as on liquidity and estimation risk. His research has been published in leading academic journals like Journal of Financial Economics, Review of Financial Studies, and Review of Finance. He regularly presents his research results at conferences and in the national and international press. Prof. Kempf is also an advisory consultant for companies and serves as a consultant for the industry. More information about Professor Kempf: www.finance.uni-koeln.de www.cfr-cologne.de Please REGISTER: Mail: gutmann-center(a)wu.ac.at Phone: +43-1-31336-4244 CONTACT AND FURTHER INFORMATION: WU Gutmann Center for Portfolio Management WU (Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien) - Department of Finance, Accounting and Statistics Mag. Dorothea GRIMM www.gutmann-center.at