At Deadline

Alan Brown resigned as group CIO of State Street Global Advisors effective March 18. He was based in London. Sources speculated his departure was related to the January appointment of William Hunt to replace Timothy Harbert as CEO. Following Mr. Harbert's death last year, Mr. Brown and Peter Leahy had been acting co-CEOs.

With Mr. Brown's departure, SSgA will eliminate the global CIO role, said Arlene Roberts, a spokeswoman. London-based Rick Lacaille will remain CIO for Europe, and Lochiel Crafter will remain CIO for Asia Pacific from Tokyo. Both report to Mark Lazberger, CEO for State Street, Japan. Sean Flannery was named to the new position of CIO for North America and will report to Mr. Hunt. Mr. Flannery, who is based in Boston, will remain director of the global fixed-income team.

The SEC plans to assign two to three members of its examination staff to a large mutual fund and investment management firm to monitor compliance with federal regulations, said Lori Richards, director of the SEC's office of compliance inspection. "We will start with 10 or 12 of the largest firms and if (the monitoring program) works, we'll expand it," Ms. Richards said March 16 at the Mutual Funds and Investment Management Conference in Palm Springs, Calif., sponsored by the Investment Company Institute. The SEC will not announce which firms will be assigned monitors.

The program is part of a push to ensure greater continuity of oversight and increased levels of communication, Ms. Richards said.

The New Mexico Legislature passed a bill March 16 allowing the $11.5 billion New Mexico State Investment Council, $9.6 billion New Mexico Public Employees Retirement Association and $6.7 billion New Mexico Educational Retirement Board, to invest in alternative investments such as real estate, hedge funds and private equity.

Gov. Bill Richardson is expected to sign the bill, which eliminates the so-called "legal list" of permissible investments and replaces it with guiding principles of the Uniform Prudent Investor Act. The bill also requires the three investing agencies to report quarterly to the state on investment performance and annually on any changes in written investment policies.

Morgan Stanley dropped Rorer Asset Management from its approved list of investment advisers for its Access wrap account program, confirmed a Morgan Stanley spokeswoman who asked not to be identified. She declined to provide additional details.

A letter to Access clients, obtained by Pensions & Investments, said Rorer had been on watch since July 2004 and was dropped because of poor stock selection decisions, continued underperformance and a significant drop in assets under management — to $4.7 billion at the end of 2004 from $9.4 billion a year earlier.

Morgan Stanley had used Rorer Asset's large-cap value equity and balanced value strategies.

Edward Rorer, chairman and chief investment officer at Rorer, did not return calls seeking comment.

UAL projected pension obligations of about $4.9 billion between 2005 and 2010, according to the United Airlines parent company's annual report. Company officials estimate pension obligations of $1.3 billion in 2005, a combined $2.7 billion in 2006 and 2007, a combined $800 million in 2008 and 2009 and $100 million in 2010.

The company ceased contributions to its pension plans in July 2004, and airline officials have said the company must terminate its defined benefit plans and replace them with less expensive defined contribution plans to obtain sufficient exit financing and emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. The carrier's pension plans had roughly $7.2 billion in total assets as of Dec. 31, according to the report.

Clark Consulting received a subpoena from the New York attorney general's office March 9, seeking documents containing information on Clark's contingent commission agreements on the sale of retirement products, said Jim Radosevich, vice president, corporate finance and investor relations at Clark.

Clark intends to fully cooperate and is in the process of gathering the requested information, Mr. Radosevich said. He said other consulting firms have been subpoenaed on contingent commission agreements.

The $10.3 billion Chicago Public School Teachers' Pension & Retirement Fund rejected a proposal to hire Benchmark Financial Services to conduct a conflicts-of-interest audit of the plan's general investment consultant, Mercer Investment Consulting, said Kevin Huber, CFO and acting executive director. Trustees didn't give a reason.

Separately, the board reallocated the $130 million in core fixed-income managed by MDL Capital Management, adding $75 million to a core bond portfolio run by Taplin Canida & Habacht and $55 million to one run by LM Capital, Mr. Huber said. MDL remains a manager, although it doesn't have any of the fund's assets, Mr. Huber said.

The board also hired Capri Advisors and DV Realty, both minority-owned real-estate managers, to handle $25 million each in diversified real estate, pending contract negotiations, Mr. Huber said. Funding will come from reallocations from existing managers.

The $4.8 billion Municipal Employees' Retirement System of Michigan hired Delaware Investments to manage $200 million in active domestic large-cap value equities and LSV Asset Management to manage $300 million in a Russell 1000 Value enhanced index portfolio.

Funding for the portfolios will come from terminating a $500 million Russell 1000 alpha tilts fund managed by Barclays Global Investors, said Jeb Burns, CIO.

Mr. Burns the change "has nothing to do with BGI's performance, but rather (is for) manager diversification and sticking with our policy of placing active managers" on top of core passive and enhanced strategies.