Just as a recovery in investors’ confidence begins to make life a little easier on one front for asset management chief executives, another problem arises: retaining talented portfolio managers whose compensation plans have lost their value.

Investors that three months ago were unwilling to place money with a start-up have changed their minds. Last week, quoted alternative manager Man Investments made a $50m (€35.2m), long-term investment in 5:15 Capital Management, a new, eight-person firm focusing on fixed-income arbitrage, set up by proprietary traders from US investment bank Greenwich Capital Markets and traders from UK hedge fund manager Brevan Howard.