high water mark
n.— «Finally, most hedge funds have something called a high water mark. It requires hedge fund managers to make investors whole before they can start collecting their 20 percent of the profits—regardless of how long that takes. Hedge fund managers don’t get to start from scratch every Jan. 1 the way their mutual fund brethren do.» —“Running a Hedge Fund Is Harder Than It Looks on TV” by Andrew Ross SOrkin New York Times Aug. 19, 2008. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
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