Hedge funds are in danger of becoming boring.

The successful listing of Brevan Howard's second investment vehicle, the $1 billion (£505 million) BH Macro, shows that appetite is red hot for players that can tick all the right boxes for nervous investors.

Brevan is established, runs about $20 billion of assets, and can easily recruit respected figures, such as Lord Turnbull, former Cabinet Secretary, to be the fund's chairman.

It is also most likely to have a compliance department that would warm the heart of a visiting official from the Financial Services Authority.

This is, of course, exactly what is needed to ensure that hedge fund blow-ups are a thing of the past and that investors' assets are safe as houses.

Yet it feels increasingly likely that hedge funds will have to start to play safe, particularly as they take on more institutional pension fund money and have to worry about the retirement savings of thousands of local authority workers.

What the fundraising also indicates is that, to be successful at the moment, hedge funds have to be stable and big.

Unfortunately, for traders, this makes life less interesting. Many left their previous investment bank employers because they yearned for the freedom associated with going it alone.

Now, with many London hedge funds resembling mini-investment banks, they must feel as if they have returned to their old haunts.

Hedge funds will always play their own tune, it's just less likely to be rock'n'roll any more.

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