Hedge fund manager lashes back at Obama on Chrysler

By Svea Herbst-Bayliss

BOSTON (Reuters) - Prominent hedge fund manager Clifford Asness has struck back at the Obama administration, saying hedge funds had the right and responsibility to hold out on last week's Chrysler LLC restructuring deal.

"Managers have a fiduciary obligation to look after their clients' money as best they can, not to support the President, nor to oppose him, nor otherwise advance their political views," Asness, who oversees about $20 billion at AQR Capital Management, LLC wrote in an undated letter.

Asness, who made his reputation and fortune in quantitative investing where computer models select stocks and bonds, spoke out days after Obama forced the automaker into bankruptcy protection and called several holdout lenders "speculators."

In a rare flash of anger, Obama scolded a small group of holdouts on Thursday and said he does not stand with these people when everyone else is making sacrifices.

The secretive and powerful $1.3 trillion hedge fund industry is seething in private. Asness responded more publicly.

In a letter, widely circulated on Wall Street and obtained by Reuters, Asness complained that Obama has gotten the industry all wrong and effectively misunderstands what investment managers must do for their clients.

"Let's be clear, it is the job and obligation of all investment managers, including hedge fund managers, to get their clients the most return they can," Asness wrote.

"If they give away their clients' money to share the 'sacrifice,' they are stealing."