Carolyn Weiss is the chief financial officer and treasurer of The New York Community Trust (The Trust), Community Funds Inc. (CFI), and The James Foundation, a position she accepted approximately five years ago. Weiss is responsible for all financial operations of the three non-profit grant making organizations, which combined manage approximately $2.8 billion in assets. “I …
The Mission Related Investment fund at the $13 billion Ford Foundation is seeking investments that support the preservation of affordable housing in the U.S. and expanded access to vital financial services to low-income households in the Global South. According to Christine Looney, deputy director of mission investments, investments in these sectors will be administered through the Foundation’s $1 billion …
The $8.5 billion Missouri State Employees’ Retirement System (MOSERS) has issued a request for proposals seeking a specialty consultant for illiquid alternatives. The system’s current allocation to illiquid alternatives is approximately 25% of assets, or about $2 billion, according to MOSERS’ CIO Seth Kelly. MOSERS hired a Board Investment Consultant, Verus, to fill the general …
When investing in U.S. equities, index funds are the way to go, according to Bill Thatcher, portfolio manager, equities and private credit, at the $10 billion Arizona Public Safety Personnel Retirement (AZ PSPR). He says he’s done the research to prove it. Thatcher will publish his research on the active versus passive question, which touts his …
Panelists at Markets Group’s Sixth Annual Texas Institutional Forum in Austin, Texas, last week, delved deep into the topic of private debt as an asset class. They weighed in on the difficulties in benchmarking for the asset class, allocating to the asset class and everything in between. Moderator Sylvia Owens, a senior portfolio advisor at Aksia, …
The investment environment in China is in a transformational state, a condition that is contributing to some misperceptions about the market by U.S. investors, even as they seek more assiduously now than ever to understand the opportunities there and the best ways to access them, according to Douglas Eu, managing director, and CEO of Allianz …
Though just five percent (or 400) of 8,000 hedge funds (HFs) are even considered investable, according to Joe Marenda, a managing director and hedge fund specialist at Cambridge Associates, “the beauty [of hedge funds] is really in the eye of the beholder—based on portfolio need,” he said. Though institutional investors are currently holding their allocations …
A recent study released by The Center for Retirement Research at Boston College, titled Stability in Overall Pension Plan Funding Masks a Growing Divide—which looks at the funding ratios of state and local pension plans around the country—finds that the pension plans that ranked lowest in terms of funding status also reported the lowest returns on their …
The assets-to-liabilities funding ratio of the Kentucky Retirement System (KRS) in Frankfort fell to 12.9% on June 30, from 13.6% earlier, according to a report to the system’s board by the fund’s actuaries last week. Some at the fund expect the ratio to fall further before bottoming out. The pension fund had approximately $2 billion …
Earlier this month, Greg Parsons, CEO of Semper Capital Management, a New York-based asset management boutique with approximately $3.2 billion in assets under management, addressed a group of service-disabled veterans, military spouses and caregivers who were nearing the end of a five-month business and entrepreneurship fellowship program at Georgetown University, which included real-life work experience at a non-profit …
