market folly

Dmitry Balyasny's hedge fund firm Balyasny Asset Management has filed a 13G with the SEC in regards to shares of Baltic Trading (BALT). In the filing, they disclose a 5.52% ownership stake in the company with 925,000 shares. This is a brand new position for them and it appears as though they received shares in the initial public offering (IPO) on March 11th, 2010.

Balyasny Asset Management, nicknamed BAM, was founded by Dmitry Balyasny in 2001. It has over 100 employees with the main office in Chicago and other offices in Greenwich, Hong Kong, London, Mumbai, and New York. Their investment process involves fundamental research by sector as well as dynamic capital allocation. They place a heavy weighting on experience and organize their teams so that they can concentrate on any given idea.

Balyasny likes to "focus on misunderstood situations and companies/sectors undergoing turbulent change from different perspectives." Through their research process they seek to identify unique ideas with attractive risk return. For 2009, Balyasny's Atlas Global Fund was up 8.64% as noted in our hedge fund performances post. In terms of other recent activity out of Balyasny, we wrote about their 13G filing on shares of Maguire Properties (MPG).

Taken from their recent press release, Baltic Trading is "a Marshall Islands company recently formed by Genco Shipping & Trading Limited, plans to conduct a shipping business focused on the drybulk industry spot market. Baltic Trading plans to use the proceeds of the offering, together with a $75 million capital contribution received from Genco, to acquire its initial fleet of two Capesize newbuildings and four 2009-built Supramaxes and for working capital and general corporate purposes, which may include future vessel purchases."

For more of the latest hedge fund portfolio movements, head to our coverage of the latest SEC filings.