Battered CalPERS fund picks new investment chief
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California’s biggest pension fund, reeling from heavy losses in the 2008 market meltdown, looked north to find its next investment chief.
The California Public Employees’ Retirement System today said it had hired the executive director of the Washington State Investment Board to manage the giant CalPERS portfolio as chief investment officer.
Joe Dear, 57, has overseen a total of $68 billion in portfolios for 38 separate public-employee retirement funds in the Washington system since 2002.
At CalPERS, he’ll take on a fund that now holds $178 billion in assets.
Dear replaces Russell Read, who left CalPERS in June to manage an environmental and green-technology investment fund in New England.
CalPERS’ portfolio, which includes stocks, bonds, real estate and commodities, has lost about 25% of its value since July 1 amid the global plunge in financial markets.
It will be Dear’s job to figure out how best to recoup those losses over time. If CalPERS continues to struggle it could demand that state and local government agencies boost their employer contributions to the fund so it can meet its pension obligations to retirees.
Rob Feckner, president of CalPERS’ board, said Dear was the board’s unanimous choice. ‘Over the last six years, Washington State Investment Board has had good results and been exceptionally well managed,’ Feckner said.
The Washington board’s largest fund gained 7.9% a year in the 10 years ended June 30; CalPERS earned 6.7% a year in the same period.
Dear supervised a staff of 23 investment professionals in Washington. At CalPERS, he will be in charge of more than 220.
Dear also serves as chairman of the Council of Institutional Investors, an association for public and corporate pension funds.
His annual salary at CalPERS will be $425,000 plus a possible bonus. In Washington, he earned $223,100 a year.
-- Marc Lifsher
