Amoeba Capital Partners, a Singapore-based hedge fund manager, is shutting down and will return money to investors by the end of the year from its sole US$135 million ($176 million) long/short equity fund, its founder said on Friday.

Ashutosh Sinha, chief investment officer of Amoeba Capital Partners and a former Morgan Stanley portfolio manager, told Reuters he needed a break.

“I wanna take some time off after working non-stop as a fund manager for more than 15 years,” he said.

“It is a very simple story. By 31st December we will return all the capital to our investors.”

The long/short fund, which started operation in 2006, was up 5.1% year-to-date by the end of August, but Sinha said there were redemptions which scaled down the size of the fund from a peak of US$750 million.

Prior to founding Amoeba Capital in 2006, Sinha was managing director, head of Asian investments, and co-portfolio manager for global emerging markets at Morgan Stanley <MS.N>.

The closure of Amoeba Capital was earlier reported by financial website AsianInvestor.