Who would have thought some years ago that pensions funds and insurance companies would become participants in the market for risk of default of other firms? On the other hand, hedge funds manage nowadays five times more assets than in 1998 and are involved in less liquid markets.
Also their returns have become more correlated across supposed different types of funds which seems to indicate that they could be subject to the same type of risks in a period of tighter credit and stressful equity markets. From all this the question that emerges is to determine if some new regulations are necessary or could be helpful at this stage.