Louisiana Municipal Police Employees captures 7.6% return for fiscal year

Louisiana Municipal Police Employees Retirement System, Baton Rouge, returned a net 7.6% for the fiscal year ended June 30, up from a net -10.3% for the previous year.

The $2.5 billion pension fund's return fell below the policy benchmark return of 8.3% for the period, according to an investment report on its website.

For the three, five and 10 years ended June 30, the pension fund returned an annualized net 6.9%, 5.4% and 6.4%, respectively, compared to the respective benchmarks of 6.3%, 5.3% and 6.6%.

The latest fiscal year's significant improvement over the prior fiscal year reflects improved returns both in equities and fixed income. For the year ended June 30, the Russell 3000 and Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate Bond index returned 18.9% and -0.2%, respectively, well above the respective returns of -13.9% and -10.3% for the year ended June 30, 2022.

By asset class, international equities posted the highest return at a net 17.9% for the fiscal year ended June 30 (just below the benchmark return of 18.8%), followed by domestic equities at a net 16.7% (below the 19% benchmark); emerging markets equities, a net 5.4% (1.7%); fixed income, 3.5% (1.9%); private equity, -2.6% (0.6% one quarter lag); and real estate, -9.8% (-10.7%).

As of June 30, the actual allocation was 30.5% fixed income, 29.9% domestic equities, 14.2% international equities, 9.2% private equity, 8.5% real estate, 7.4% emerging markets equities and 0.3% cash.

The target allocation is 34% fixed income, 31% domestic equities, 14% international equities and 7% each emerging markets equities, private equity and real estate.