How a hedge fund using reporters would operate

Kate Duguid, Joshua Franklin, Ortenca Aliaj and James Fontanella-Khan of The Financial Times examine how Hunterbrook, the hedge-fund like operation using journalists to provide research, would operate.

Duguid, Franklin, Aliaj and Fontanella-Khan report, “Reporters at the company will not seek out material non-public information though, like a hedge fund, may encounter it while reporting.

“Any articles written by Hunterbrook reporters will be reviewed by compliance officers for material non-public information and then a decision will be made on whether they are tradable stories for the hedge fund. In instances where articles contain material non-public information, the company plans to publish the stories without trading on the news before publication.

“Using journalism to drive financial investments is not a new idea. Mark Cuban, the billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks basketball team and panellist on CNBC’s Shark Tank, in 2006 launched Sharesleuth. The venture was smaller, with a handful of journalists on staff to report on suspected fraud or deception at companies, and still publishes occasionally.”

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Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.