摘要：The global financial crisis that hit the world economy in 2008 and 2009 brought to the forefront hedge funds, thought by many to have played a significant role in producing the crisis. The basis of this erroneous assessment by the public regarding hedge funds is a result of superficial understanding of their functioning on global financial markets. For this reason, this article presents a comprehensive survey of hedge funds, starting with a definition and an overview of their origins and development in its introductory part, followed by a description of their principal features. The description of the types of hedge funds presented here, classified according to the manner of operation and the different strategies employed, serves best to illustrate the peculiarities of hedge funds in comparison with other subjects present in financial markets. As the legal regulation of hedge funds appears to be a controversial issue of debate among experts, the following part of the article presents a comparative analysis of the regulation of hedge funds in the USA, where they first emerged, and in selected EU Member States. An outline is also presented of the situation in the Republic of Croatia, where the capital market is in an early development stage, as are the pertinent regulations, and where there is little, if any, space for the operation hedge funds. De lege ferenda, as Croatian regulations are being approximated to EU acquis, it can be expected that the capital market will become more open to new possibilities, including hedge funds.
