Bermuda-based company HedgeWorld has partnered with a financial services group to run background checks on hedge fund managers world-wide at a cost of $2,750 and up.

HedgeWorld founder and CEO Johann Wong told The Royal Gazette it is the distribution partner for the online reports while NCO Inc. Group will perform the background checks.

Mr. Wong said NCO - which is a public company - has over the last ten years, performed more than 200,000 background checks.

The two groups were prompted to set up the service based on the rapid growth in an industry of investment pools that generally come with a price tag of at least $1 million or more per investor.

It is an industry that has also seen some investors get burned to the tune of millions of dollars.

A notable case was the Manhattan Fund Investment scandal - which was administered and audited in Bermuda by Ernst & Young Fund Administration (Bermuda) and Deloitte & Touche - with its manager Michael Berger losing close to $500 million in investor funds.

Reuters news agency, reporting on the new service, said: "The new service is being launched at a time the $550 billion industry is booming and thousands of funds are launched annually and investors of every stripe, stung by mutual fund losses, want the steady returns many hedge funds promise," it said.

And although $2,750 may sound steep, compared with other search firms' fees, HedgeWorld's prices are relatively low, according to Reuters.

Mr. Wong added that their platform offered convenience as it was over the Internet, and reports - the background searches will check out public records for criminal records, bankruptcy filings or problems with regulators - would be held "in inventory" for the standard price of $2,750.

But the service does not stop there, Mr. Wong said in addition to the standard service there will be enhanced standard and special investigations service, that could even include surveillance of the subject.

The services come with price tags according to the complexity of the search.

Mr. Wong said that while some background searches will be straightforward, others may be more complex.

He cited, for example, a hedge fund manager that has worked in a number of countries with searches needing to be done in each jurisdiction the manager worked.

There are no guarantees on the information, but Mr. Wong said that NCO has a strong reputation based on years of doing thousands of background searches, and in many different areas.

HedgeWorld is a private company that set up on the Island in 1999 and went live in September of that year. It has 28,000 registered members worldwide and offers information and market services to the industry.