The California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) announced the appointment of Trish Taniguchi as director of the $73.2 billion global equities portfolio. “Trish has been at the helm of this asset class, either as an interim or as co-director, since March 2008 and has done a wonderful job in consolidating our equities portfolio from distinct U.S. and Non-U.S. asset classes to its current global equities mix”
The announcement is effective immediately. Taniguchi will direct a staff of 11 who manage the global equities portfolio, which accounts for 55.2 percent of the $132.6 billion CalSTRS investment portfolio as of February 28, 2010.
The global equities staff directly manages one third of the portfolio and oversees 58 external managers. They oversee and manage a developing manager program, and the CalSTRS sustainable investment and directed brokerage programs. Global equities staff also evaluates the investment options for the Pension 2 program, the defined contribution options for CalSTRS members.
“Trish has been at the helm of this asset class, either as an interim or as co-director, since March 2008 and has done a wonderful job in consolidating our equities portfolio from distinct U.S. and Non-U.S. asset classes to its current global equities mix,” said CalSTRS Chief Investment Officer Christopher J. Ailman. “Trish’ ability to effectively oversee this large and complex portfolio through the most turbulent market since the Great Depression speaks to the excellence of her qualities as a leader.”
The move from U.S./Non-U.S. equities to global equities came about in February 2009 after the financial crisis revealed that both domestic and non-U.S. stocks behaved similarly and that segregating them into separate asset classes was not an effective approach to diversification.
Taniguchi joined CalSTRS Global Equities in 2001, from a staff position at CalSTRS Private Equity, where she worked six years. She has 17 years of investment management experience and holds a Bachelor of Science degree in business administration.
The California State Teachers’ Retirement System is the second largest public pension fund in the United States. It administers retirement, disability and survivor benefits for California’s 848,000 public school educators and their families from the state’s 1,400 school districts, county offices of education and community college districts. |
