Alternative Investments: A Primer for Investment Professionals provides an overview of alternative investments for institutional asset allocators and other overseers of portfolios containing both traditional and alternative assets. It is designed for those with substantial experience regarding traditional investments in stocks and bonds but limited familiarity regarding alternative assets, alternative strategies, and alternative portfolio management. The primer categorizes alternative assets into four groups: hedge funds, real assets, private equity, and structured products/derivatives. Real assets include vacant land, farmland, timber, infrastructure, intellectual property, commodities, and private real estate. For each group, the primer provides essential information about the characteristics, challenges, and purposes of these institutional-quality alternative assets in the context of a well-diversified institutional portfolio. Other topics addressed by this primer include tail risk, due diligence of the investment process and operations, measurement and management of risks and returns, setting return expectations, and portfolio construction. The primer concludes with a chapter on the case for investing in alternatives.

And key messages -- Key principles of governance and investment management -- Governance of public pension assets -- Governance structures and accountabilities -- Qualification, selection, and operation of governing bodies -- Operational policies and procedures -- Managing fiscal pressures in defined-benefit schemes -- Policy responses to turbulent financial markets -- Investment of public pension assets -- Defining the investment policy framework for public pension funds -- Managing risk for different cohorts in defined-contribution schemes -- An asset-liability approach to strategic asset allocation for pension funds -- In-house investment versus outsourcing to external investment managers -- International investments and managing the resulting currency risk -- Alternative asset classes and new investment themes.

Intense media coverage of the public pension funding crisis continues to fuel heightened awareness in and debate over public pension benefits. With over $3 trillion in assets currently under management, the ramifications of poor oversight are severe. It is important that practitioners, researchers, and taxpayers be well-advised regarding any concer

Countries around the world are increasingly relying on individual pension savings accounts to provide income in old age for their citizens. Although these funds have now been in place for several decades, their performance is usually measured using methods that are not meaningful in relation to this long-term objective. The recent global financial crisis has highlighted the need to develop better performance evaluation methods that are consistent with the retirement income objective of pension funds. Compiling research derived from a partnership among the World Bank, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and three private partners, 'Evaluating the Financial Performance of Pension Funds' discusses the theoretical basis and key implementation issues related to the design of performance benchmarks based on life-cycle savings and investment principles. The book begins with an evaluation of the financial performance of funded pension systems using the standard mean variance framework. It then provides a discussion of the limitations inherent to applying these methods to pension funds and outlines the many other issues that should be addressed in developing more useful and meaningful performance measures through the formulation of pension-specific benchmark portfolios. Practical implementation issues are addressed through empirical examples of how such benchmarks could be developed. The book concludes with commentary and observations from several noted pension experts about the need for a new approach to performance measurement and the impact of the recent global financial crisis on pension funds.

From the Wharton School, offering a comprehensive assessment of the political and financial dimensions of public-sector pensions from the colonial period until the emergence of modern retirement plans in the twentieth century.