What access gets a biz journalist: Sources to start a hedge fund

For former CNBC anchor Ron Insana, who still appears from time to time on the business news cable network as a senior analyst, access to Wall Street heavyweights is allowing him to launch his own hedge fund, writes Wall Street Journal reporter Dennis Berman.

Berman, writing on the Deal Journal, blog, noted that Insana’s fund of funds is using many of the sources that Insana developed as a business journalist to get off the ground.

Berman wrote, “Insana has pressed on, and has enlisted UBS and top hedge-fund law firm Schulte Roth & Zabel as adminstrators and advisers. The fund is ‘an expression of the Firms’ macroeconomic outlook as guided by Ron Insana,’ the documents describe.

“As any good reporter knows, access can be money in the bank. And here the document is up front about what Insana is offering, saying it capitalizes, in addition to financial analysis, ‘on the long-standing relationships of the Firm’s founder Ron Insana.

“‘Many of the funds accept new investments on a highly selective basis – if at all,’ the document says.

“The former CNBC anchor has lined up a blue-chip roster of managers, according to the review of the fund documents. Among the list of 13 funds in which Insana will invest: SAC Capital Advisors, Renaissance Technologies Corp., Perry Corp. Third Point, Omega Advisors and Icahn Management. (Insana declined to comment.)”

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