New York City Retirement Systems achieved an estimated 12.3% return for the fiscal year ended June 30, according to John Liu, the city comptroller who serves as investment adviser to, custodian, and trustee of the five public pension funds that make up the $137 billion retirement system.
For the previous fiscal year, ended June 30, 2012, the pension system had assets of $122 billion and an investment return of 1.4%.
In a news release, Mr. Liu said the preliminary unaudited return for the fiscal year exceeded by about 100 basis points the combined and weighted average of the individual pension funds' various asset class benchmarks.
The pension funds have an actuarial assumed rate of return of 7%.
Audited numbers for the fiscal year will be available in October, Lawrence Schloss, deputy comptroller and chief investment officer, said in an interview. Estimated returns for the most recent quarter are not yet available, Mr. Schloss said.
Mr. Schloss said the pension system's returns benefited from an overweighting in U.S. equities and high-yield debt as well as an underweighting in U.S. government bonds and Treasury inflation-protected securities.
The five pension funds in the New York City Retirement Systems are the New York City Employees' Retirement System, Teachers' Retirement System, Police Pension Fund, Fire Department Pension Fund, and the Board of Education Retirement System.
