Fund's golden boy rakes in £10m

MARTIN Hughes' gamble on himself has paid a handsome £10m return. The hedge fund he set up two years ago, Toscafund, last year made a profit of £6.6m on sales of just £11m.

Hughes, the sole shareholder, takes all, as well as a £2.9m salary and a £500,000 paper profit on his personal investment in the fund. In 2000, the company lost £4,000 on sales of £655,000.

Hedge funds make their money by quickly dipping in and out of shares to take advantage of short-term rises or falls that do not reflect a company's underlying value. Hughes' company specialises in investing in large financial and business services stocks around the world.

Before Hughes set up Tosca he was a portfolio manager at Tiger Management, a hedge fund run by Julian Robertson - the man once dubbed the King of the hedge fund industry. Tiger was wound down after the value of its funds plummeted.