RiverPark Structural Alpha Fund (RSAFX)

JoeNoEskimo

I know Riverpark is a favorite on this forum, and this new fund could be quite interesting for low volatility seekers.

http://www.riverparkfunds.com/downloads/Prospectus/RiverPark_Structural_Alpha-Prospectus.pdf


RiverPark utilizes principally four basic investment strategies that when used in combination RiverPark believes will allow the Fund to achieve is investment objective. Although each of the strategies can be analyzed independently, RiverPark believesit is important to manage the Fund as a portfolio of these different strategies. Depending on market conditions, RiverParkwill opportunistically overweight or underweight its allocation to any single investment strategy. These decisions are based on managing the risk profile of the portfolio and bottom-up analysis of the pricing of various option strategies available in the marketplace and are not based on any opinions regarding the direction of markets. RiverPark believes that by adhering to the Fund’s investment strategies it can achieve the Fund’s investment objective whether markets are generally rising or falling.

RiverPark’s principal investment strategies are first, to generate equity exposure through the use of long-dated call and put option spreads. Option spreads are generally the purchase and sale of options with the same maturity date, but different strike prices. At maturity, an index option has a value based on a contractual obligation that is equal to its intrinsic value.These option spreads will, if held to maturity, contractually generate superior returns when compared to the underlying index in market environments where the returns on the index are less than the capped return. Conversely, these positions will lag the underlying index, but will, if held to maturity, still generate positive returns, if the underlying return on the index is greater than the capped return. It is the Fund’s intention to normally hold spread positions with different capped returns and maturities. Secondly, the Fund will typically be short a basket of short-dated straddles and strangles on various market indices. Short straddles and strangles are generally the sale of a put option and the sale of a call option with the same maturity date, and the same exercise price in the case of straddles, or different exercise prices, in the case of strangles.

This investment strategy involves the sale of index options that RiverPark believes are expensive and therefore should
structurally contribute to the portfolio’s alpha. This strategy, which is market neutral, is intended to generate income and should provide superior returns in relatively stable or range-bound markets. The third investment strategy is a market short designed to reduce the portfolio’s exposure to market declines. Finally, the Fund seeks to generate what it believes will be modest income by investing the majority of its assets in cash alternatives or what RiverPark believes constitutes a diversified basket of mostly short-term fixed-income instruments. The Fund expects that the fixed-income instruments will be mostly U.S. Treasury Bills, overnight deposits at large commercial banks, commercial paper and investment grade securities with maturities of less than 3 years. Other than government securities and the bank deposits, positions sizes are expected to be limited to less than 5% of the Fund’s assets. This portfolio of fixed income instruments will provide the necessary collateral to support the Option Portfolio.

scott

Sounds like a better hedge fund than a mutual fund. I just question whether these complicated multi-strategy alternative funds can work to their potential, given the constraints of the mutual fund structure.

Interesting though and thanks for posting.

VintageFreak

With $8 million in assets, how good it would be if we had some evidence of manager commitment. The SAI says no manager investment. If I knew managers had like $500K of their money in this fund, even $100K, then I know the believe in their strategy. Without that, when I read the prospectus, it sounds like gobbledeegook instead of something intelligent.

claimui

I couldn't make heads or tails of that strategy. Is it any similar to RiverNorth Dynamic Buy-Write Fund RNBWX, which I also don't understand but is also a low volatility (and low return) strategy?

VintageFreak

I'm not sure about RNWBX vs RSAFX. What I can say is RNWBX with its close to $20 million in assets and with its SAI also not showing any evidence of manager ownership, also has a prospectus I will not understand

David_Snowball

Dear friends,

One of the folks at RiverPark was approached by a prospective investor in RSAFX, who'd read this thread and was curious about the level of insider investment in the fund. RiverPark shared this note:

The SAI that is referenced in the discussion was as of 6/27/13, prior to the actual fund launch. At that point there were no insiders with more than 5% of assets because the managers had a little over $400K invested in the predecessor partnership and that didn’t quite make the 5% threshold. Today, in addition to their investment of just over $400K in the fund, other RiverPark insiders have roughly $2 million in the fund. The fund currently has roughly $9.5 million total.

So about 21% of the fund's shares are held by the managers and other employees of the adviser.

For what interest it holds,

David

VintageFreak

Yes, I realized that. I actually bought this fund.