Private Equity Firms: Another View

[roni]

I wanted to pull this out of its most baldly political context (that other thread), and post a link here to an opinion piece from Oregon's Democratic State Treasurer (Ted Wheeler) and the Chairman of the Oregon Investment Council (Keith Larson).

They are responsible for overseeing the investment of billions of dollars in the Oregon public employees pension and the Individual Account Plans of thousands of Oregon state, city, school, and county employees.

Here is a link to the column

With pension fund investments, private equity pays off for Oregon

and here is a link to how the investments have done since 2004, which is when the Individual Account Plans started as the defined contribution part of a hybrid retirement plan

IAP Performance

Here are the first few paragraphs of the essay

Three decades ago, Oregon changed the landscape of the investment world. Through the citizen-led Oregon Investment Council, Oregon became the first state where a public pension fund made an investment in an asset class known as "private equity." That leadership has paid huge dividends for Oregon, and it has been good for your pocketbook because of sizable investment gains.

It also put Oregon on the map as a savvy, responsible investor -- a reputation that Oregon enjoys today.

Since 1981, private equity has been the top performer in the Oregon Public Employees Retirement Fund. For the past decade, the time-weighted annual return for Oregon's private equity investments was 11.35 percent, versus 4.71 percent for the S&P 500.

Private equity is a vital part of the strategy of seeking out the best value and returns for Oregonians.