Washington State Investment Board returns 10% for fiscal year

Washington State Investment Board's $101.3 billion commingled trust fund returned a net 10.04% for the fiscal year ended June 30, topping its custom benchmark by 37 basis points, a report on the Olympia-based board's website said.

For the three, five and 10 years ended June 30, the trust fund returned an annualized net 8.62%, 9.5% and 6.61%, respectively, outperforming their respective benchmarks of 8.07%, 9.04% and 7.15%. The fund returned 13.44% for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2017.

By asset class, the best-performing asset class for the fiscal year ended June 30 was private equity, which returned a net 15.85% (compared to its custom benchmark of 18.37%), followed by real estate at a net 4.84%, the custom benchmark of which lagged one quarter. Public equities returned a net 11.42% (below its custom benchmark of 11.47%) and tangible assets, the custom benchmark of which also lagged one quarter, returned a net 4.27%. Lastly, fixed income returned a net 0.02%, above its custom benchmark of -0.28%.

As of June 30, the commingled trust fund's actual allocation was 34.6% public equities, 21.8% fixed income, 20.6% private equity, 17.2% real estate, 4.4% tangible assets and 1.4% cash.

The commingled trust fund is the combined investment pool of the state defined benefit plans the board oversees. The Washington State Investment Board oversees a total of $130.2 billion in the assets of 17 retirement plans, 13 permanent and other trust funds and five state insurance funds.