Tag: New Jersey pension investment

New Jersey Pension Investment Return Falls Short of Assumed Rate in 2014

New Jersey State House

New Jersey’s pension system earned a 7.27 percent return on its investments in 2014 – down from a 16.9 percent return in fiscal year 2013-14.

The growth fell short of the system’s assumed rate of return.

From NJ.com:

New Jersey’s pension fund earned 7.3 percent on its investments last year, which state officials said beat market expectations.

But those gains didn’t live up to the 7.9 percent annual rate experts say is needed to keep troubled pension fund from adding to its liabilities.

The investments returned 7.27 percent, but were hurt largely because of market volatility in the second half of the calendar year, said Tom Byrne, acting chairman of the State Investment Council.

“For that period of time we were ahead of our benchmark by just a tiny bit but behind the 7.9 percent bogey,” Byrne said. “One period of time only tells you so much.”

[…]

Byrne noted that the investment council’s role is only half the battle. While it manages the state’s investments, it doesn’t have any say in setting or making pension contributions.

“The pension is still underfunded, and we can only do what we can do,” Byrne said.

Governors from both parties have underfunded the pension system since 1996, shortchanging the annual payments or skipping them altogether.

Pension officials defended the system’s recent dive into alternative assets; officials said those investments have earned the system an additional $2.8 billion in returns since 2010.

 

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Geithner Tells NJ Pension Panel He’s Bullish on Economy

New Jersey seal

Former U.S. Treasury secretary Timothy Geithner made an appearance at Thursday’s meeting of New Jersey’s State Investment Council, the entity that oversees the state’s pension investments.

Geithner was at the meeting because he is president of a private equity firm, Warburg Pincus, that handles a portion of the state’s pension money.

During his appearance, he talked about his optimism on the state of the U.S. economy. Reported by NJ.com:

Timothy Geithner, the former U.S. Treasury secretary and an architect of the Wall Street bailout, today told New Jersey’s pension investment council that despite the challenges of a “complicated, messy world,” he’s optimistic about the nation’s economy.

“The economy today looks much more resilient than it’s been in some time,” Geithner said, noting the expansion after the Great Recession has been moderate, steady and matched with restructuring of important financial underpinnings.

[…]

Taking questions from the council, he counseled them on global dynamics, including Russia, China and the emerging markets.

The U.S. is well-positioned to benefit from growth in those markets, that while “volatile and uncertain,” will grow faster in the long-term, he said.

“I think there is a reasonable basis for believing that we’re still at the early state of what’s likely to be a long period where average growth in these emerging economies is still two or three times the growth of major economies,” he said.

The meeting was also notable because it saw the release of an audit into a potential pay-to-play rule violation by Charlie Baker. The audit cleared Baker of any wrongdoing.