Sacramento Bee (Free subscription) | 11/21/2009
When he visited The Bee's editorial board this week, Rob Feckner, president of the California Public Employees Retirement System Board, didn't deliver many surprises. He expressed the board's concerns about placement agents – well-connected middlemen who steer billions of dollars of pension fund investments to their clients. He outlined plans to censure board members who may have had improper...
Sacramento Bee (Free subscription) | 11/20/2009
... said. The fund's portfolio sits at about $202 billion. In an interview this week, board President Rob Feckner said Cal- PERS has recovered about half of its investment losses. CalPERS manages retirement benefits for more than 1.6 million California public employees, retirees and their families.
Sacramento Bee (Free subscription) | 11/19/2009
CalPERS' president, promising to clean up an influence-peddling scandal at the big pension fund, raised the prospect Wednesday of publicly reprimanding board members and employees who violate ethical standards. "We won't let the actions of a few stain or tarnish the 77-year history of our organization," board President Rob Feckner said in an interview with editors and reporters at...
L. A. Times Dodgers Blog (Free subscription) | 11/20/2009
... Employees' Retirement System, known as CalPERS. No opposition was expressed, and board President Rob Feckner directed staff members to draft legislation that would make the middlemen, known as placement agents, subject to the same rules as the professional lobbyists who attempt to influence the Legislature, governor's office and state agencies. The CalPERS board is expected to formally endorse...
Sacramento Bee (Free subscription) | 11/15/2009
Officials at the California Public Employees' Retirement System are scrambling to respond to a series of embarrassing disclosures regarding close relationships between CalPERS officials and placement agents – politically connected middlemen who helped steer billions of dollars of pension fund investments to their clients. CalPERs board president Rob Feckner last week endorsed legislation...
Mondo Visione (Free subscription) | 11/12/2009
Rob Feckner, President of the California Public Employees' Retirement System's (CalPERS) Board of Administration, and California's State Controller and Treasurer, today called on their fellow CalPERS board members to support stronger laws that would require placement agents and organizations that hire them to be subject to the reporting and ethics rules governing lobbyists under the California...
Sacramento Bee (Free subscription) | 11/12/2009
Using blunt language to address a growing scandal, CalPERS' president Wednesday urged his board to support legislation designed to curb the role of placement agents – marketing representatives who seek investment dollars from CalPERS and other public pension funds. Rob Feckner, the board president, endorsed legislation being drafted by state Controller John Chiang and state Treasurer Bill...
Sacramento Bee (Free subscription) | 11/12/2009
CalPERS' president today endorsed legislation designed to curb abuses by placement agents, middlemen hired by investment firms to get deals from CalPERS and other public pension funds. Rob Feckner, the CalPERS board president, called on fellow board members to rally around legislation being drafted by Controller John Chiang and Treasurer Bill Lockyer, who also sit on the board. The legislation...
DealBook (Free subscription) | 11/12/2009
... effort of a veteran board member who chaired Calpers’ investment committee.Calpers board President Rob Feckner in a letter to other board members called for strengthening rules to better police placement agents — on top of a state law passed this year that would restrict how they do business at state pension funds.“Feckner said stronger rules need to be put in place given recent events...
Los Angeles Times (Free subscription) | 11/11/2009
Reporting from Sacramento - The board president of the California Public Employees' Retirement System today called for state legislation that would drastically change the way fees are paid to financial intermediaries who help investment companies get business from pension funds.The proposal by CalPERS board President Rob Feckner comes in direct response to a growing uproar over disclosures by...
L. A. Times Dodgers Blog (Free subscription) | 11/11/2009
Reporting from Sacramento - The board president of the California Public Employees' Retirement System today called for state legislation that would drastically change the way fees are paid to financial intermediaries who help investment companies get business from pension funds.The proposal by CalPERS board President Rob Feckner comes in direct response to a growing uproar over disclosures by...
L. A. Times Dodgers Blog (Free subscription) | 11/06/2009
Rob Feckner asks fellow directors not to meet privately with so-called placement agents while the public employees pension fund conducts an investigation of the intermediaries' activities. The board president of the nation's biggest public employee pension fund is urging his fellow directors to avoid private meetings with go-betweens who help pitch private-equity investments to the fund.
Sacramento Bee (Free subscription) | 11/08/2009
Rob Feckner, president of the California Public Employees' Retirement System board, has asked his fellow trustees to stop meeting with placement agents. Cutting contacts with placement agents is the absolute minimum board members charged with protecting retirement funds for 1.6 million California public employees should commit to, given the string of recent embarrassing disclosures about CalPERS....
Sacramento Bee (Free subscription) | 11/07/2009
... by State Controller John Chiang and Treasurer Bill Lockyer, in consultation with CalPERS President Rob Feckner and CalPERS Chief Executive Anne Stausboll. Chiang and Lockyer serve on the CalPERS board. The legislation follows stories in The Bee this week detailing the activities of placement agent Alfred Villalobos, who has earned at least $60 million over the past decade representing clients...
Sacramento Bee (Free subscription) | 11/06/2009
... Alfred Villalobos in cash. Valdes' new explanations came an hour after CalPERS board President Rob Feckner announced that he's asked trustees to stop meeting with placement agents like Villalobos and also ordered all financial firms and their agents to stop advancing travel money to "anyone associated with CalPERS." "Our investment partners and their agents must honor our...
