market folly

Eliav Assouline and Marc Andersen's hedge fund Axial Capital Management are at it again. They've purchased an additional 100,000 shares of QLT Inc (QLTI) at a price of $5.70. The purchase, which took place on August 11th, 2010, means that Assouline & Andersen's hedge fund now owns 6,441,812 QLTI shares. As we've extensively detailed, Axial has been buying QLTI over the course of a few months.

Some investors have categorized QLT Inc as a value trap while others think of it as a 'cigarette-butt' value play. Essentially, many investors are betting on the biotech company's royalty stream. Those categorizing it as a value trap think that this royalty stream, while healthy now, is likely to decline. Andersen and Assouline obviously disagree with that take since they have been accumulating shares.

Axial Capital was listed as one of Institutional Investor's 'Hedge Fund Rising Stars.' The hedge fund was seeded back in 2005 by Julian Robertson and offices at the same 101 Park Avenue address as legendary hedge fund Tiger Management. You can view the proverbial Tiger Family Tree of managers that Robertson has spawned or seeded.

Taken from Google Finance, "biotechnology company. The Company is engaged in the development and commercialization of therapies for the eye. The Company focuses on its commercial product, Visudyne, for the treatment of wet age-related macular degeneration (wet AMD), and developing its ophthalmic product candidates."

To see what other top managers are up to, head to our collection of recent hedge fund investor letters.