Latest news with #DavidRamli
Bloomberg
06-05-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
Big Take Asia: CEO's Fakery Sparked $300 Million Crash
In late 2018, five years after launching fish-feeding company eFishery, Gibran Huzaifah found himself all out of cash. To save his business, the CEO started plugging fake numbers into financial reports. The brighter picture drew hundreds of millions of investor dollars. But his house of cards was doomed to collapse. On today's Big Take Asia Podcast, host K. Oanh Ha talks to Bloomberg's David Ramli about the fall of eFishery and what it says about the risks of venture capital investing.
Yahoo
10-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Balyasny Tops Millennium and Citadel During February Turmoil
(Bloomberg) -- Balyasny Asset Management LP gained the most among the world's biggest multi-manager hedge funds in February as tariff threats and bubbling economic concerns shook markets. Cuts to Section 8 Housing Assistance Loom Amid HUD Uncertainty How Upzoning in Cambridge Broke the YIMBY Mold Remembering the Landscape Architect Who Embraced the City NYC Office Buildings See Resurgence as Investors Pile Into Bonds Hong Kong Joins Global Stadium Race With New $4 Billion Sports Park Balyasny's hedge fund rose 0.9% during the month, according to people with knowledge of the matter. That brings the fund's year-to-date gain to 3.5%, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the results are private. Millennium Management lost 1.3% in February while Citadel fell 1.7%, the people said. By contrast, Singapore-based Dymon Asia Capital saw its multi-strategy fund focused on the region end the month up 1%. All five of Balyasny's strategies were positive in February, according to one of the people. The three strongest performers were its equities, commodities and macro strategies, the person said. Recent economic reports show signs of both stubborn inflation and flagging growth in the US just as President Donald Trump's proposed tariffs add uncertainty to equity markets. The S&P 500 Index fell 1.4% during the month. That extended the US stock gauge's underperformance to the Euro Stoxx Index and the MSCI China Index to more than 10 percentage points in the first two months of the year in dollar terms. The so-called Magnificent Seven stocks that have driven hedge fund returns in recent years are sputtering as investors question their valuations and hefty spending on artificial intelligence. In contrast, European stocks have seen better returns and Chinese equities are surging. The pain of some of the multi-strategy managers was shared by US-focused funds that bet on rising and falling stocks, with Goldman Sachs Group Inc. clients employing that strategy on average down 1.4% in February, the Wall Street bank's prime services team said in a note. By contrast, their Asia peers gained 1.9% on average for the month, while European funds notched up a 0.5% gain. Representatives for the investment firms declined to comment. --With assistance from David Ramli. (Updates with Dymon number in third paragraph, Goldman Sachs notes in seventh) Rich People Are Firing a Cash Cannon at the US Economy—But at What Cost? Snack Makers Are Removing Fake Colors From Processed Foods The US Is Withdrawing From Global Health at a Dangerous Time The Mysterious Billionaire Behind the World's Most Popular Vapes Trump's SALT Tax Promise Hinges on an Obscure Loophole ©2025 Bloomberg L.P.
Yahoo
25-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Temasek, SoftBank among eFishery investors that could face wipeout
By David Ramli and Olivia Poh (Bloomberg) — Investigators hired by the board of eFishery Pte. have determined the Indonesian startup is in far worse shape than they previously thought, and that investors are likely to get back less than 10 cents for every dollar they invested, according to documents seen by Bloomberg News. The company, which deploys feeders to fish and shrimp farmers in Indonesia, incurred several hundred million dollars in losses between 2018 and 2024 and misrepresented its financial figures for years, according to the documents and a person familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified because the information isn't public. 'eFishery is not commercially viable in its current form,' said a presentation prepared for the firm's investors by FTI Consulting Singapore Pte., the adviser hired to review the business and take over management of the company. The fallen startup, whose financial backers include SoftBank Group Corp. and Singapore's Temasek Holdings Pte., had been a star of Indonesia's startup scene. eFishery was valued at US$1.4 billion ($1.87 billion) in 2023 after it raised US$200 million from Abu Dhabi's 42XFund and some of its earlier investors. In all, global investors plowed around US$315 million into eFishery's preferred shares over five funding rounds, according to the presentation. In late 2024, the company was rocked by allegations of misconduct and inflated sales and profits, which led to the dismissal of its co-founders Gibran Huzaifah and Chrisna Aditya. The FTI presentation estimated that eFishery had around US$50 million in cash as of around mid-February, and recommended that much of the business be wound down. 'The cash balance continues to deplete without a restructuring plan in place,' it said. That's bad news for preference shareholders, all of whom would be paid back on an equal, or pari passu basis in the event of a liquidation. The investors could get back 9.5 cents on the dollar under an 'optimistic scenario,' and just 8.3 cents on the dollar under a 'conservative scenario, according to the presentation. That would mean Abu Dhabi's G42, which invested US$100 million in the April 2023 round, may get just US$8.3 million back less than two years later. A spokesperson for FTI Consulting declined to comment. SoftBank didn't immediately respond to a request for comment outside regular business hours, while a Temasek spokesperson declined to comment. G42 didn't immediately respond to an emailed request for comment. Before its downfall, eFishery said its business revolved around installing AI-driven smart fish feeders, sensors and automated supply chains that connected farmers to buyers via smartphone apps. It also helped farmers obtain financing from peer-to-peer lenders and financial institutions to pay for their feed and operational costs. The company had claimed to have more than 400,000 fish feeders deployed, and investigators initially estimated the number was closer to 24,000. The current estimate is just 6,300, of which only 600 are sending back data, according to the presentation. The investigators also found that there was a high default rate on the financing arrangements, and that eFishery bears all losses when farmers fail to repay their loans. 'In theory, the proceeds from the harvest or cash collected from farmers should be repaid back to the lenders,' the presentation said. 'In practice, however, eFishery faced significant challenges when it comes to collection from borrowers.' Hampering the debt collection process were the huge distances and fragmented nature of Indonesia's developing economy, where almost 10 per cent of the population lives below the poverty line. About 76 per cent of eFishery's US$68 million in accounts receivable were deemed as bad debt more than 60 days overdue, with the company ultimately liable for the bulk of loans it facilitated with banks, according to the presentation. 'Substantial costs would need to be incurred to realise or recover these outstanding amounts from borrowers who are scattered all across the country,' it said. The company's fish and shrimp businesses were operating on thin margins and 'severely loss making,' the presentation said. Key apps were not connected to eFishery's accounting systems, and many farmers were manually matched with buyers, the investigators found. Much of the advanced technology that the firm touted did not work as claimed, according to the presentation. None of eFishery's PondTag sensors that were supposed to help remotely judge water quality and automate fish and shrimp feeders had been deployed. The limited data collection meant fish feed predictions were wrong almost half the time, the document said. In essence, eFishery was 'operating like a traditional trading business without technology,' the presentation said, noting that this helped explain the company's large workforce of almost 2,600 employees at its peak in early 2024. Following mass job cuts since the start of this year, the company has roughly 200 staffers. More stories like this are available on ©2025 Bloomberg L.P.
