Shopping trolley is seen in front of Alibaba logo in this illustration, July 24, 2022. [Source: Reuters]

“Big Short” investor Michael Burry, Farallon Capital Management, and Coatue Management were among the prominent hedge fund managers who took large bets on Chinese companies ahead of the reopening of the country’s borders in January after nearly three years of restrictions, securities filings showed on Tuesday.

Burry, who came to fame ahead of the 2008 financial crisis by betting against U.S. real estate, added a new position of 75,000 shares in Chinese e-commerce company JD.com Inc (9618.HK) and a new position of 50,000 shares in Chinese tech giant Alibaba.com (9988.HK), filings show.

Burry was featured in the 2010 nonfiction book “The Big Short” by Michael Lewis which was made into a popular movie five years later.

Farallon, meanwhile, added 2,197,000 shares of Alibaba, while Coatue added 4,796,186 shares of Alibaba and 1,221,551 shares of JD.com.

The moves come as China’s reopening has prompted record inflows into emerging market equities, according to data from Bank of America Global Research, and helped lift assets ranging from crude oil to European luxury goods makers in anticipation of a re-emergence of demand.

China began taking steps to end its zero-COVID policy, which was among the world’s strictest anti-coronavirus regimes, in December. It officially reopened its borders in early January.

The SSE Composite index is up 6.6% for the year to date, slightly behind the 7.9% gain in the U.S. benchmark S&P 500.

Hedge fund managers’ positions were revealed in 13F filings that show what fund managers owned at the end of the quarter. While they are backward-looking, these filings are one of the few public disclosures of hedge fund portfolios.