UPDRAFT. Dan Loeb’s hedge fund, Third Point, returned more than 20% last year for investors in its flagship Offshore Fund, Loeb said in a letter to investors on Wednesday. Third Point has made activist bets on huge corporations like Walt Disney and Intel and managed to avoid dangerous short exposure, but it got a big assist from an investment in startup Upstart. The consumer loan firm went public in December at $20 a share, and its stock more than doubled by the end of the year. Loeb first invested back in 2015, and Breakingviews calculations based on disclosures in his letter and Upstart’s prospectus suggest Third Point turned a total $70 million-odd investment into well over $500 million by Dec. 31. The share price has since more than doubled again. Another Third Point-backed fintech lending outfit, SoFi, is helping too. It’s selling itself to a special-purpose acquisition company, and the SPAC’s shares have almost doubled since the deal was announced last month. Loeb can thank both for a good start in 2021. (By Jennifer Saba and Richard Beales)