History
Based in Portland, Maine and Bermuda, Stone Coast Fund Services provides independent fund administration, administrator oversight, on-site consulting, and director services to onshore and offshore hedge funds. We are committed to superior service, long-term relationships and investor confidence. Whether a manager wishes to outsource or in-source its back office needs, Stone Coast's services ensure controlled and efficient operations.
Stone Coast is a professional services firm, unlike the high-turnover "NAV Factories" that crowd the administration landscape. Our staff experience and stability far exceed industry norms, allowing us to specialize in complex credit-and-derivatives-heavy portfolios whose needs often are served poorly by institutional administrators. At the same time, we offer efficiency and value for the most straightforward funds.
Prior to starting Stone Coast, the company’s principals founded and led the highly regarded U.S. hedge administration business of a major independent fund administrator and, later, of a major global custody bank. A stellar reputation for service quality and client loyalty led to "Best In Class" and "Top Rated" honors in Global Custodian magazine’s surveys of hedge fund client satisfaction. Stone Coast's staff draws heavily from the most senior and experienced of the founders’ former colleagues, resulting in a team that has worked together for many years and has exceedingly low turnover.
Vision
Hedge management firms are typified by a concentration of professional staff and a keenly entrepreneurial mindset. Many fund administrators, in contrast, have become NAV factories, focused on volume rather than quality. The combination often results in mismatches in competence, professionalism and organizational philosophy. Although Stone Coast offers exceptionally robust technology and infrastructure, we believe that quality administration is more than ever defined by the quality and commitment of staff.
Dissatisfaction with administrators invariably sounds the same themes:
- Staff turnover results in unfamiliarity with our funds and their needs.
- Too many people touch our funds. None share a sense of ownership and overall accountability.
- Our administrator doesn't adequately understand the instruments that we trade or the strategies that we pursue.
- Our administrator has good people, but they are stretched too thin. My funds do not get sufficient attention.
We believe that the key to successful administration is the long-term assignment of professional staff to only a very few funds. In contrast to the assembly-line approach of most administrators, Stone Coast's Account Managers are responsible for the full range of their clients’ portfolio and investor accounting needs. Clients get a single point of contact that is intimately knowledgeable about their issues and fully answerable for their satisfaction. Most important, Stone Coast Account Managers fully identify with the entrepreneurial mission of their clients and function as a true extension of the manager’s own professional team. This approach is made possible by a Stone Coast team that averages eight years of industry experience, with most staff having held senior positions at other firms. With almost no turnover, Stone Coast offers a concentration of quality and experience far surpassing what any other administrator offers.
