CalPERS continues to build out its hedge fund capability and seeks four additional investment professionals to join its six-person team, said Egidio “Ed” Robertiello, senior portfolio manager, absolute-return strategies, for the $258.3 billion pension fund.
In fact, Mr. Robertiello during his presentation on Monday at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Beverly Hills, Calif., asked audience members to send him their resumes.
The California Public Employees' Retirement System also is researching hedge fund replication and continues to focus on pushing fees lower. “Hedge funds have not made enough concessions; they haven't gone far enough,” Mr. Robertiello stressed, suggesting pension executives in the audience demand that hedge fund managers “create a pension fund share class at 1% and 10%.”
Mr. Robertiello said the Sacramento-based pension fund's hedge fund team also is “exploring” a move to a managed account platform from separate accounts for direct investment in hedge funds. The advantage, Mr. Robertiello said, is that the third-party managed account platform would handle day-to-day operations, operational risk management reviews and would move valuation to a daily basis from monthly.
“Managed accounts make it easier to perform risk management,” Mr. Robertiello said, because daily valuation and portfolio transparency make stress-testing much simpler.
