University of Kentucky, Lexington, expects to issue an RFP for an investment consultant for its $1.2 billion endowment in late 2015, recent investment committee minutes indicate.
RVK has served as the endowment's investment consultant since 2008. Its contract expires in 2016. RVK will be invited to rebid. The RFP will be posted on the university's website in fall 2015.
Also, the university is targeting a Jan. 1, 2015, hiring date for its first chief investment officer, according to recently released minutes from an earlier investment committee meeting. Further information on the search could not be learned by press time.
Separately, the university is transitioning from a $38 million commingled hedge fund-of-funds strategy with Grosvenor Capital Management to a roughly $59 million customized hedge fund-of-funds portfolio with Grosvenor for its endowment. The goal of the new program is to reduce fees, the minutes said.
The customized portfolio will be comprised of seven hedge funds.
Funding for the new customized hedge fund-of-funds portfolio will come from the termination of Grosvenor’s Enhanced Long/Short Equity Fund, a commingled hedge fund of funds ($39 million) and Grosvenor’s See Blue Fund ($18 million), the university’s separately managed absolute-return strategy, said Susan Krauss, treasurer for the university, in an e-mail. The remaining $3 million will come from cash.
