Elena Ambrosiadou, one of the best known hedge fund bosses in the world, was on Friday night forced to seek a high-court injunction to block publication of “private” information by the firm’s co-founder – who also happens to be her husband.
Martin Coward, who set up Ikos with his wife 18 years ago, is understood to have made a series of damaging allegations relating to Ms Ambrosiadou’s stewardship of Ikos as part of a divorce claim filed last week in a Greek court.
This week, Ms Ambrosiadou’s lawyers have been battling to prevent any of the information being made public, however, Mr Coward gave the papers to Reuters on Friday afternoon. In a statement that was published by the news agency he said: “I have decided today to circulate the legal filing, in order that any reporting may be based on the facts.”
Ms Ambrosiadou’s lawyers, who claim that the Greek court hearing was private, immediately sought an emergency injunction to prevent the wider publication of the court documents.
The extraordinary spat, which will surprise investors, reveals serious divisions between the hedge fund’s co-founders. Although Mr Coward resigned as chairman of Ikos six months ago, the company insisted that the couple remained on good terms.
At its height Ikos had around $3.5bn (£2.4bn) of funds under management. As with many hedge funds, the assets dropped in the wake of the financial crisis and now stand at around $1.5bn.
In the past two years the fund has parted company with some of its long-standing staff including Dr Peter Ho, a senior researcher who had worked for Ikos since 1993, and Dr Sam Glover, a specialist derivatives trader who is thought to have run around 80pc of all funds managed by the firm.
It is understood that Mr Coward felt increasingly excluded from running the hedge fund and in particular from decisions regarding staff changes.
Ms Ambrosiadou and Mr Coward started Ikos, which means “home” in Greek, in 1992 as one of the first hedge funds set up in London. Greek-born Ms Ambrosiadou originally trained as a chemical engineer, before becoming an executive for BP when she was 27. She founded Ikos aged 33 with just $600,000 in a managed account.
Ms Ambrosiadou, who has an estimated fortune of £200m, was one of the first hedge fund managers to move parts of her business away from London amid growing concerns about the Labour’s tax regime.
Mr Coward, a former Goldman Sachs star was not as high profile as his wife, despite being a crucial partner in Ikos. In November, Ms Ambrosiadou spent a reported £60m on the world’s biggest sailing boat, The Maltese Falcon. She bought the yacht from Tom Perkins, the American venture capitalist, with whom she sailed across the Atlantic in 2008.
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