Asia-focused hedge funds have struggled to make headway so far this year.

Goldman Sachs is reportedly shutting two Asia-Pacific focused hedge funds with a total of $1.4 billion in assets because of weak performance, highlighting how funds have struggled to make headway in the region.

The closure will also involve the departure of the funds’ managers: Hong Kong-based Ryan Thall and Hideki Kinuhata in Tokyo, the Financial Times (of London) has reported, citing unnamed sources. The newspaper said the US firm declined to comment.

The funds made money by focusing on movements in equities, the report said. 

The report said that the Oryza Capital fund, which manages less than $500 million, concentrates on Asian equities and returned only 0.6 per cent this year. The Global Long-Short Partners fund is split into two segments comprising publicly traded securities and private equity. The public part of this fund is to be closed, the newspaper said, adding that the closures were first reported by Bloomberg.

Returns across the hedge fund universe have been lacklustre since the start of this year. The HFRI Fund Weighted Composite Index, produced by Chicago-based Hedge Fund Research, is up just 0.81 per cent in the year to the end of June. The HFRI Asia With Japan Index fell by 2.79 per cent over that period.

This publication has contacted Goldman Sachs for comment and may update in due course.