Stark Investments has had a difficult spring. Like most hedge funds, the $4.4 billion Milwaukee, Wis. firm, founded by Brian Stark and Mike Roth in 1992, suffered losses in May in both of its funds, Stark Investments and Shepherd Investments International. On top of May’s losses, five of Stark’s principals left, including the firm’s chief operating officer and president, Colin Lancaster.
“May featured a pretty stunning list of kablooies, fubars, snafus, WTFs and what are euphemistically known as ‘government actions,’” read a June 7 investor letter on the performance of Stark Investments and Shepherd, which fell 4.43% and 4.03% in May, respectively. Both are flat for the year.
“In several respects, May at its worst points was a mini-me version of the nightmarish 2008 experience, replete with whipsawing markets (though plunging more often than not), soaring correlations across normally disparate asset classes, and...