Michigan system hires hedge fund manager

The Municipal Employees' Retirement System of Michigan, Lansing, hired Money Management Group to run about $40 million in a global macro hedge fund, said Jeb Burns, CIO of the $4.3 billion plan. The fund is putting about a third of the cash portion of its 5% private equity allocation into a hedge fund to get better returns over the 18 to 36 months before the money is invested elsewhere, with less volatility than money tied to the S&P 500. One-third of the private equity cash pool is in certificates of deposit, and the other third is equitized to the S&P 500. The fund's private equity investments now total about $80 million. Staff will invest the remaining private equity allocation opportunistically over the next 18 to 36 months, using proceeds from the best performing of the three cash strategies, Mr. Burns said. Separately, the fund's total performance in 2003 was 24.7%, Mr. Burns said.