For the lower-profile HNA Group, which has interests in cloud computing companies, airlines and hotels, the acquisition of the SkyBridge Capital hedge fund of funds firm last month was part of what it described as a strategy to “build a global asset management business.” The small spurt of deals is occurring as Asian companies look for expertise on where to invest their stockpiles of money and hone their ambitions to become financial conglomerates. Firms like SkyBridge Capital, which offer investors a chance to spread their money around in an array of other hedge funds, the so-called fund of funds business that layers on additional fees, have had a particularly difficult time lately. HNA Group, the Chinese aviation and shipping conglomerate, took a piece of a New York hedge fund company last month, a week after buying a New Zealand investment company. SoftBank paid $3.3 billion for Fortress, less than half its $7.4 billion value when it became one of the first private equity firms to publicly list shares in February 2007. Masayoshi Son, the billionaire founder of SoftBank, wants to create a “Berkshire Hathaway of the tech industry.” In January, he met with President Trump, then the president-elect, pledging to invest $50 billion in the United States and to create jobs there as part of a new $100 billion investment fund called SoftBank Vision Fund. Despite concerns about the business models, investment firms like Fortress and SkyBridge offer these buyers new distribution networks and access to wealthy investors
