Institutional investors including pension schemes and insurers have turned their attention back to smaller hedge fund managers after two years of investing with large firms has, too often, led to disappointing performance.

According to a survey of investors just published by Deutsche Bank, a large provider of financing for hedge funds, 65% of investors anticipated the average size of hedge funds to which they would allocate in 2011 would be under $1bn. This is in marked contrast to the 44% who are currently invested with funds larger than $1bn.