What’s eating Lee Kye-woong? The South Korean fund analyst at Goodmorning Shinhan Securities appears to have gotten bent out of shape because he believes a fund that’s made amazing returns is in truth a hedge fund, and should be classified as such. According to Korea Times, the fund in question is the Korea Corporate Governance Fund, affectionately referred to as the Jang Ha-sung Fund, after the Korea University professor who heads it. Managed by U.S.’ Lazard Asset Management, KCGF describes itself as a socially responsible investment fund and in its first three months it returned 170%, thanks to a wise investment in Daehan Synthetic Fiber in August. Well, that hasn’t sat well with Lee. “Many people think of the...fund as an (SRI) fund thanks to the funds purpose of improving the governance of firms that the fund invest in.” But, Lee points out, “Corporate governance improvement is different from SRI themes like environmental protection, as it can be achieved in the short term when investors take aggressive measures such as changing the management.” Thus, he proclaims, KCGF is nothing more than a hedge fund seeking short term gains. Lee further supports his assertion by noting that the KCGF is like hedge funds in that it doesn’t offer opportunities to individual investors (at least in Korea). But a KCGF official denies it’s a hedge fund, despite enjoying those short-term gains. “According to the contract,” says the official, “we cannot withdraw funds before two years and we invest only in Korean stocks.”