Missouri’s risk-based
asset allocation

A decision by two of Missouri’s public pension plans to adopt a straightforward risk-based approach to asset allocation garnered their best result in two decades last year, while also providing investment staff with the autonomy to react quickly to changing market conditions. The board overseeing the Public School Retirement System of Missouri (PSRS) and the … Read more

Illinois pension reform

At least one state in the US is acting on the need for epic reform of its pension system, but the political difficulty associated with such reform – something all states are wary of – was demonstrated in the violent outburst by Illinois representative, Mike Bost, last week (see video) and the inability of representatives … Read more

Ang angles for more dynamism at CPPIB

The Ann F Kaplan professor of business at Columbia Business School, Andrew Ang will teach a case study on the Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board’s (CPPIB) reference portfolio in the fall. While for the most part complimentary of the approach and process, he challenges the Canadian fund to consider a more dynamic reference portfolio. The … Read more

Governance disclosure needs nutrition label

Pension funds should disclose their governance arrangements using a methodology similar to a nutrition label, with members easily able to compare the transparency and accountability of fund standards, a leading corporate-governance expert from Yale says. Dr Stephen Davis, the executive director of Yale School of Management’s Millstein Centre for Corporate Governance and Performance, has called … Read more

Mercer lists priorities for Norway’s GPFG

A report finding Norway’s $582.7-billion sovereign wealth fund could face significant losses in a range of climate-change scenarios is unlikely to result in changes to the fund’s investment strategy, Norway’s state secretary Hilde Singsaas says. Norway’s Ministry of Finance released the report into the Government Pension Fund Global’s (GPFG) that it commissioned from Mercer and … Read more

CheckRisk rethinks the risk business

Beta-driven equity investors may currently be taking far greater risks than they are getting paid for when seeking broad market exposure, British risk expert Nick Bullman warns. Bullman, the founder of specialist risk consultancy CheckRisk, has developed a methodology using macroeconomic research along with econometric and behavioural risk inputs to identify what he describes as … Read more