Javno – Calpers lost nearly $60 billion in the financial markets last year, which means it has a serious long-term shortfall. Joseph A. Dear, the fund’s new invesment head, thinks the cure is in hedge funds and beaten-down private equity.

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Tags: calpers, financial-markets, hedge funds, invesment, shortfall

Reuters – The California Public Employees’ Retirement System (Calpers), which manages $169 billion in public pension funds, may boost its private-equity investments by around 40 percent as slumping markets create some acquisition bargains.

Calpers’ board next week is scheduled to vote on a plan that would increase the fund’s target for corporate buyout and venture-capital investments to 14 percent from 10 percent.

Spokesman Clark McKinley said the fund’s $22.8 billion of such investments has jumped to 13 percent as the sinking value of stocks and other assets reduced the size of the overall fund.

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Tags: acquisition, assets, bargains, california public employees, california public employees retirement, california public employees retirement system, calpers, corporate buyout, employees retirement system, mckinley, private equity investments, public employees retirement, public-employees-retirement-system, public-pension-funds, reuters, spokesman, stocks, target, venture-capital-investments

American Chronicle – A Los Angeles businessman has pleaded guilty to corruption charges in a pension fund scandal that began in New York and is heading west.

Julio Ramirez Jr.’s guilty plea to securities fraud, revealed Tuesday in New York, tightened the connection between that state’s scandal and the pension fund industry in California. The charges arise from Ramirez’s work as an unlicensed "placement agent" for Wetherly Capital Group of Los Angeles, a politically connected firm that has secured investment business from CalPERS and CalSTRS.

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Tags: american chronicle, businessman, calpers, capital-group, corruption charges, guilty plea, heading west, investment business, julio ramirez, pension-fund, placement agent, quot, scandal, securities fraud, tuesday in new york

Seeking Alpha – According to "Calpers Weighs Expanding Own Hedge-Fund Investments" by Jenny Strasburg and Craig Karmin (Wall Street Journal, April 16, 2009), the giant California pension fund may be the first stop for fledgling hedge fund managers who seek start-up resources. Described as a way to have "more control over its money," incubating hedgies would "mirror an approach the $175 billion pension fund has taken with private-equity managers."

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Tags: calpers, craig, fund investments, giant california, hedge-fund-managers, jenny, karmin, money, pension-fund, private equity managers, seeking alpha, strasburg, wall street, wall-street-journal

Pensions & Investments – CalPERS is boldly going where no pension fund has gone before with hedge funds.

The $175 billion California Public Employees’ Retirement System, Sacramento, will be the first pension fund to move its $4.6 billion portfolio of 26 direct hedge funds to separately managed vehicles (managed accounts in hedge fund parlance) from commingled hedge funds, according to sources.

The proposed creation of a CalPERS-owned multistrategy hedge fund that will provide an incubation platform for promising emerging hedge fund managers is another first among pension funds, industry observers said.

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Tags: amp, california public employees, california public employees retirement, california public employees retirement system, calpers, employees retirement system, hedge-fund-managers, incubation, industry observers, investments, parlance, pension funds industry, pension-fund, pensions, public employees retirement, public-employees-retirement-system