BlackRock has rolled out a long/short equity hedge fund with a global developed markets twist.

BlackRock has rolled out a long/short equity hedge fund with a global developed markets twist, to be co-managed by Kevin Franklin, lead portfolio manager for global strategies within the firm’s “Scientific Equities” team, and Gearoid Neligan.

The BSF BlackRock Global Long/Short Equity Fund seeks to achieve a “positive absolute return with a low correlation to the global developed equity market, by going both long and short in pursuit of alpha”, a statement by the US asset management giant said.

The fund seeks to achieve a low correlation to traditional equities by increasing portfolio diversification; it can invest in more than 3,000 developed market companies covering the top slice of liquidity across 25 countries, BlackRock said. The fund looks to deliver equity-like returns of around 5 per cent -7 per cent each year after fees above $3M T-Bills, with a target volatility of 7 per cent. The underlying strategy has existed since December 2012, during which time it has delivered a Sharpe ratio of 2.3 and standard deviation of 5.4 per cent vs 10.2 per cent for the MSCI World.

The Fund is currently registered for sale in Sweden, Norway, Ireland, UK, Finland, Spain, France, Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, Austria, Belgium and Italy.