The state’s largest public pension fund has an interim chief investment officer.
Vijoy Paul Chattergy, an investment specialist with the Hawaii Employees’ Retirement System, has been appointed by its eight-person board of trustees to oversee the $11.5 billion fund while a search is undertaken for a permanent replacement.
The ERS fund provides retirement, disability and survivor benefits to 111,648 active, retired and inactive state and county employees.
Chattergy, 44, who grew up in Niu Valley and graduated from Punahou School, replaces Rod June, who had been CIO since January 2008. June returned to California earlier this month to become CIO for the Los Angeles City Employees’ Retirement System. Chattergy took over as interim CIO on July 6.
June’s annual salary was $166,250, while Chattergy’s interim CIO salary has been set by the board at $110,000. No salary has been determined yet for the new CIO position.
"Rod did a lot of good things for us here," Hawaii ERS Administrator Wes Machida said Friday. "He brought a lot of structure to the investment program. He expanded the private equity program that will help us down the road by hiring a consultant (Richmond, Va.-based Altius Associates Ltd.) to assist with the program. He also formalized a trustee education policy" to help trustees learn more about investments and fiduciary responsibilities.
Besides receiving private-equity consulting from Altius, the ERS board is advised on stock, fixed-income and overall investments by Portland, Ore.-based Pension Consulting Alliance, and real estate investments by Cleveland-based Courtland Partners Ltd.
The pension fund, which reports its full-year fiscal 2012 results Aug. 13, was up 1.4 percent through the first nine months of the fiscal year, which ended June 30. In fiscal 2011 the fund rose 20.7 percent.
Machida said the ERS board will be forming a committee to select an executive search firm that will look for June’s successor. The ERS board comprises four members appointed by the governor and four elected by ERS membership. Machida said he anticipates the search will take three to six months, considerably shorter than the previous one-year search for June when some of the finalists turned down offers and necessitated a reopening of the recruitment process.
Chattergy said he wants to find out what the process will be to select the permanent CIO before deciding whether to apply for the position.
"Right now I’m really focused on doing the job at hand and making sure nothing falls through the cracks," Chattergy said. "Once they decide how they want to go forward (with the CIO selection), I’ll see what the situation is and then decide. I can always return to my former position."
The role of the CIO is to focus on policy and asset allocation issues, while the investment specialist position concentrates more on daily risk management and executing the policy decided by the trustees.
Prior to joining the state ERS, Chattergy worked for the East-West Center and FG Energy as an assistant project manager and consultant, respectively. Before that, Chattergy was a senior-level analyst with the hedge fund group at SPARX International Ltd., which is based in Hong Kong and Tokyo.
Chattergy also previously worked in New York City for Andrew Kalotay Associates, a boutique debt advisory and analytics firm, and at The Bond Market Association, a trade group for fixed-income broker/dealers.
