Goldstein to start pro-hedge fund group

Activist hedge fund manager Phillip Goldstein has plans to create a non-profit organization to help the hedge fund industry challenge what he described as regulatory injustices. Mr. Goldstein, principal of Bulldog Investors in Saddle Brook, N.J., led the fight two years ago to overturn a rule requiring hedge fund managers to register as investment advisers by suing the Securities and Exchange Commission. “I’d like people to be able to contact me anonymously to have their voices heard,” he told an audience of hedge fund managers and securities lawyers gathered in San Francisco yesterday to discuss marketing and advertising rules for hedge funds. Mr. Goldstein, who hasn’t yet set a timeline for his latest venture as a self-described “amateur lawyer,” said he envisioned the organization as being along the lines of a chamber of commerce for alternative investments. The working name for the new organization, Mr. Goldstein said, is the Rational Regulatory Policy Institute. “Who could be against rational regulations?” he quipped. “A lot of these rules out there don’t make any sense, and I’d like to see an organization that’s willing to litigate on behalf of the industry on some of these issues because a lot of people are intimidated by the regulators,” Mr. Goldstein said. Mr. Goldstein, who manages $325 million, is battling the SEC on two separate fronts. He has asked for an exemption to the so-called 13-F rule that requires hedge fund managers to disclose portfolio holdings regularly to the SEC. In protest to what he thinks is an unjust rule, Mr. Goldstein said, he hasn’t reported his portfolio data to the SEC in 18 months. Mr. Goldstein also said he is likely to sue the SEC over rules that prohibit hedge fund managers from marketing and advertising. Yesterday’s meeting was hosted by the law firm Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP in San Francisco.