28/09/2011 Author: Kirstie Brewer

Boston pension fund allocates to EnTrust

The State Boston Retirement System has voted to allocate $60m to EnTrust, Daniel J Greene, interim executive director confirmed exclusively to HFMWeek.com last week.

The municipal public pension plan, which has around $4.7bn in assets, issued a request for information (RFI) earlier this year, in search of one or more fund of hedge funds (FoHF) managers via their investment consultant, NEPC.  

EnTrust will succeed Arden Asset Management, which was terminated in March on the advice of NEPC following their formal due diligence on the firm.

“Among other things, there had been significant manager turnover within the fund and performance was not delivering on its ‘low volatility’ mandate,” a spokesperson told HFMWeek at the time.

The retirement system has a 9% asset allocation to FoHF vehicles and, as per guidelines set by the Public Employee Retirement Administration Commission (Perac), is prohibited from making allocations directly to single managers, along with all public funds in Massachusetts.

The current FoHF line-up includes Mesirow, Federal Street, Gam and Permal and an investment with Ivy Maplewood, which has been winding down over the past year, with the retirement system redeeming almost all of its investment from the fund.

State Boston had planned to hire up to two new managers in the year ahead, but whether this is still the case, in light of the allocation to EnTrust, is as yet unconfirmed.

EnTrust is shortlisted for four awards at the HFMWeek US Performance Awards, being held on Thursday 13 October in New York.