News & Events

Castle Hall’s DueDiligenceProfessional™ online risk management system also recognized as Best Alternative Investment Diligence Platform.

Montreal, August 18, 2017 – Castle Hall, the Due Diligence Company, is pleased to announce that the firm has been recognized as the Best Global Operational Due Diligence firm for the fourth consecutive year in the Wealth and Finance International Alternative Investment Awards.

“I am enormously proud of our team’s progress” said Chris Addy, Castle Hall’s CEO. “Everyone at Castle Hall is committed, every day, to working with our clients to generate consistent, evidenced and auditable due diligence information. Our team has more than doubled in barely two years: it is wonderful to see the efforts of my colleagues, old and new, recognized by Wealth and Finance International.”

Key milestones over the past year include the integration of SwissAnalytics into the Castle Hall platform and the launch of RiskDiligence. This new service integrates the SwissAnalytics Ramses quantitative tools and broader risk due diligence capabilities within Castle Hall’s online diligence platform, DueDiligenceProfessional.

Concurrent with Castle Hall’s recognition as Best Global ODD Firm, Wealth and Finance also selected DueDiligenceProfessional as the industry’s Best Alternative Investment Diligence Platform.

 “Castle Hall’s ongoing success is based around four key factors” said Addy.

• Multi Asset Class. Investors now recognize that operational due diligence should be performed with respect to all external asset manager relationships and not restricted solely to hedge funds. The expansion of ODD across asset classes has increased Castle Hall’s diligence footprint significantly; unlike asset class consultants (hedge fund, PE, infrastructure etc.) Castle Hall provides a consistent due diligence solution, irrespective of strategy.
  
  
• Ongoing Monitoring. Traditional ODD focused on a schedule of in person diligence meetings, repeated every 1-3 years. Diligence has evolved: the foundation of an effective ODD program is now an active, real time monitoring program, where the onsite visit is just one component of a far broader toolbox of diligence procedures.
  
  OpsMonitor, Castle Hall’s due diligence monitoring platform, now aggregates more than 1,000 fund entities and accounts across hedge funds, private equity, real estate, infrastructure and traditional long only asset management.
  
  
• Just as hedge fund managers no longer use Excel for accounting, ODD no longer relies on word processed meeting reports. Technology has become critical to process ever increasing amounts of public and private information. Systems, bandwidth to curate data, and quality reporting and dashboard capabilities are vital to give asset owners an effective view of portfolio risks.
  
  
• Investment Consultant – or Governance, Risk and Compliance? The legacy model where an investment advisor or consultant also offered operational due diligence is being re-evaluated by many large allocators. Investors are increasingly conscious that effective due diligence requires a clear segregation of duties between the advocacy role of the traditional investment consultant – engaged to generate performance through fund selection and portfolio construction – and the governance, risk and compliance function of operational due diligence.

Castle Hall does not recommend investments or build portfolios. As such, Castle Hall clients access an uncompromised diligence solution, with clear segregation of duties between front office decision making and the separate governance, risk and compliance diligence workflow.