The top three administrators remained unchanged as part of the top three from HFN’s Q3 2007 survey, but there was a shift of rankings inside the top three. The largest administrator in the industry was once again Citco Fund Services, which has held the top spot in each of HFN’s prior surveys. Citco reported $482 billion in AUA in Q1 2008, an increase of 2.8% from Q4 2007 and a 10.6% gain from the prior survey. Additionally, Citco reported providing administration services to 1,542 hedge funds with the majority, 65% of those assets, in funds located in North America.

Occupying the second spot is the administration business of Citi with $228 billion in AUA, 70% of which is located in North America, for 913 hedge funds. Despite jumping from third largest in the Q3 2007 survey to second, Citi’s AUA fell 4.0% quarter over quarter which is more in line with hedge fund performance in Q1 2008. Rounding out the top three is HSBC Securities Services which reported $217 billion in AUA for 893 funds.

The remainder of the top ten in total AUA contains notables such as Goldman Sachs Administration Services, The Bank of New York Mellon, UBS Global Asset Management – Fund Services and CACEIS Investor Services. CACEIS is the second largest administrator of European hedge funds’ assets behind Citco and European hedge funds account for 75% of their total AUA.

SS&C Fund Services had the best quarter over quarter growth rates of any top ten hedge fund administrators. The Windsor, CT based administrator saw AUA increase 9.5% in Q1 2008 which is a strong grab of market share given the performance losses in the industry in Q1. SS&C administers $115 billion for 775 hedge funds. Rounding out the top ten for the Q1 2008 survey are GlobeOp Financial Services and PFPC Alternative Investments Group. HFN estimates that total industry hedge fund assets fell 1.4% in Q1 2008, entirely due to performance losses.

The results of the Q1 2008 HFN Hedge Fund Administrator Survey indicate that not only is the hedge fund industry larger than widely reported, but the expansion of third party hedge fund and fund of funds administration continues across the globe. The desire to attract institutional investors which continue to become more comfortable with hedge funds as a replacement to more traditional asset classes is an ongoing driver to growth. HedgeFund.net, with our third semi-annual HFN Administrator Survey is in position to track this development and will continue to advance our objective of being the primary source for hedge fund information.

For the Q1 2008 survey HFN requested administrators provide not only their assets under administration (AUA) for both hedge funds and funds of funds, separately of course, but also to provide a breakdown of AUA by region in which the funds are located and their AUA from the prior quarter. HFN also requested administrators separate their HF and FoF assets from managed accounts and from other alternative investment structures. This allowed administrators to report their assets in collective investment schemes such as SICAVs, SICAFs, UCITs, etc., as well as private equity and venture capital if they chose to do so.

The result of the survey is a clear picture of the total amount of single manager hedge fund assets and fund of funds assets under administration resulting in an accurate portrait of the total size of the hedge fund industry. The survey showed administrators have $2.759 trillion in single manager hedge fund AUA at the end of the first quarter 2008. This was an increase of 7.7% from the prior survey in Q3 2007. Administrators additionally reported fund of funds assets under administration of $1.389 trillion in Q1 2008, an increase of 11.0% from Q3 2007.

HFN also requested administrators provide the total number of HFs and FoFs for which they administer assets and to exclude any share classes, or to report primary fund products only. Administrators reported a total of 13,804 hedge funds and 6,562 funds of funds for which they provide administration services.