CalPERS hired BRIDGE Housing and Regis Homes of Northern California to build housing adjacent to the system’s headquarters expansion on R Street in downtown Sacramento. BRIDGE and Regis will work together in a joint venture as the $156 billion system’s residential developer. The system’s current master plan calls for 180,000 square feet of residential development adjacent to its headquarters.
Separately, CalPERS Investment Committee voted today to conduct on-site visits of up to all 14 managers targeted in the fund’s emerging-markets equity search. Previously, staff had decided to conduct on-site visits of only seven of the firms. The California Public Employees’ Retirement System plans to hire three to four managers to run a total of $1 billion to $1.5 billion.
Rosalind M. Hewsenian, managing director, Wilshire Associates, voiced concern that at least three of the seven managers would not survive the entire selection process. She added some managers in the second tier, such as Genesis, did "a lousy job” in responding to the staff questionnaire but would do a good job for CalPERS.
Mary C. Cottrill, a senior principal investment officer at CalPERS, said visiting the top seven would be sufficient, especially because those firms were most responsive in incorporating in their proposals CalPERS’ concerns about the political conditions in the countries where it invests.
Finalist interviews are slated for December.
Separately, the committee approved putting $1 billion into a passive internally managed currency overlay program. Most or all of the assets will come from reducing a $4.4 billion active currency overlay portfolio run by Pareto Partners.
