Japan’s ¥139.8 trillion yen ($1.3 trillion) Government Pension Investment Fund officially launched its asset manager registration system on Monday with a call out to interested managers of non-Japanese equities, both active and passive.
An announcement on the GPIF website said the fund will register managers of other asset classes “in due course.”
Earlier this year, an investment topics paper posted on the fund’s website said GPIF would introduce the new system to give it needed flexibility in shuffling its manager lineup, while setting the stage for competition between existing and prospective managers.
The present system’s lengthy RFP process concludes by awarding three-year contracts, which restrict the fund’s ability to flexibly tap new managers as and when needed, the paper said.
Under the new system, the GPIF will register external managers who meet basic criteria, which will be interpreted flexibly.
For example, while the announcement said investment strategies offered by managers seeking entry to the registration system should have at least ¥30 billion in assets, a Tokyo-based spokesman for the fund said GPIF will also consider, and register, products with less than that amount “if we are interested.”
Once registered, managers should provide monthly updates on investment performance. If a registered manager fails to update that information for more than three months, and GPIF can’t contact the manager, “we will cancel registration,” said the spokesman.
With the new system, GPIF will interview managers when it is looking to extend a mandate, said the spokesman.
