News & Analysis

Two pension plans solicit RFPs

One pension plan from Pennsylvania and another from Texas both set deadlines in mid-April for applications to assist with non-investment aspects of its operations.

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The Pennsylvania Public Employees’ Retirement System have and the Fort Worth Employees’ Retirement Fund have each put out requests for proposals for advisory service providers, with the former seeking a private markets consultant and the latter seeking an auditor.

PSERS is soliciting applications for a private markets consultant that would review investment objectives, policies and asset allocation for its private markets bucket. The application deadline is 20 April. The successful party will win a five-year engagement and prepare one-, three- and 10-year investment plans by 1 February each year.

In PSERS’ case, the private market category consists of private equity, venture capital and special situations, which constitutes commitments to 77 managers making up 16 percent of the fund’s $50 billion portfolio, the RFP showed. Private high-yield and PSERS’ own co-investment programme are also included in the eventual consultant’s jurisdiction.

In addition to formulating investment strategy and portfolio construction, the consultant would also conduct due diligence, help in contract negotiations and recommend managers for which PSERS should set aside commitments.

The Harrisburg, Pennsylvania-based pension plan anticipates performing full due diligence on eight to 12 private market investment opportunities and four to eight such endeavours for the private high-yield category.

PSERS has been a big investor in private credit strategies, including a $200 million commitment to the Apollo Global Management’s European Principal Finance Fund III and $100 million to Mariner Investment Group’s International Infrastructure Finance Co. II.

For its part, FWERF’s successful auditor would be awarded a five-year contract and begin by examining the pension plan’s financial statements for its fiscal year ending 30 September. Applicants must have been providing professional auditing services for at least five years and worked with at least three public or private pension funds similar to FWERF. The deadline for proposals is 24 April.

While FWERF hasn’t invested in private credit as much as PSERS, the former still made commitments to two real estate debt funds: one $20 million allocation to an M&G Investments vehicle and another to a Contrarian Capital Management.