The founder of activist investor Atticus Capital took the decision to close the group’s flagship fund and return billions to clients, rather than picking a new manager for them, because he reasoned they would rather have their money back than have anyone else at the firm manage it, according to a source close to the group.

Tim Barakett made the decision yesterday to close Atticus' global and trading hedge funds and return almost $4bn (€2.8bn) to investors in the process. Ninety five percent of the money will be paid back before the end of October and the remaining 5% by the end of the year.