CalSTRS investment committee on Thursday voted to launch an RFP for a real estate consultant sometime in June.
The $323.6 billion California State Teachers' Retirement System, West Sacramento, expects to accept responses until sometime in July and make a selection as early as October. The new consulting contract could start sometime in the first quarter of 2023.
The contract with CalSTRS' current real estate consultant, RCLCO Fund Advisors, expires Jan. 14, 2023.
The RFP is expected to be posted on CalSTRS website at https://www.calstrs.com/business-partnership-opportunities.
Separately, CalSTRS investment committee approved a work plan that includes conducting an asset liability study in fiscal year 2023. Given recent geopolitical risks including the war in Ukraine as well as the COVID-19 global pandemic, the study will start with an overview of the long-term risks to the portfolio. The committee's work plan is scheduled to be presented to the board for approval in July.
Separately, the board on Wednesday voted to oppose a state law that would prohibit the boards of specified state and local retirement systems from investing in companies with business operations in Russia or Belarus, including companies that provide revenues to the governments of Russia or Belarus. CalSTRS' board decided to oppose the bill because it would infringe on CalSTRS' authority to administer the pension plan and invest its assets.
"CalSTRS shares the sense of urgency regarding Russia's brazen and lawless military assault on Ukraine," a staff memo said. Since the war in Ukraine started in late February, CIO Christopher Ailman has stopped investing in Russian and Belarusian equities and bonds, coordinated with money managers to assess the situation to protect the plan on an ongoing basis, and followed the U.S. Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets' regulatory requirements and sanctions.
