Wisconsin adds $1.6bn to diverse alts programs

The $93 billion State of Wisconsin Investment Board added another $1.6 billion to alternative investment strategies with fresh capital allocations being made at the end of 2019 to hedge funds, real estate and private equity managers. The investment portfolio has a 13% allocation to alternatives and another 8% allocated to real estate. Roughly a dozen investments were made within private equity totaling $715 million. The Madison-based fund’s private equity portfolio has swelled to $10 billion overall and had an influx of $477 million in the third quarter of 2019 too. The largest private equity mandate in the fourth quarter was $250 million was to Leonard Green & Partners’ Green Equity Investors VIII, which has received billions from other institutional investors, including the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS). The fund closed in December with $12 billion in capital and was the Los Angeles-based firm’s eighth flagship private equity investment fund. Wisconsin allocated a total of $50 million to the Leonard Green’s inaugural dedicated middle market fund, Jade Equity Investors, which closed in December at $2.75 billion. This oversubscribed fund also received $155 million from CalPERS. Other private equity mandates were: Cortec Group Fund VII ($50 million); Saros Investments ($160 million); Shamrock Capital Content Fund II ($50 million); Turn/River Capital IV ($25 million); Volition IV ($20 million); Volition Select Fund I ($10 million); Yellow Wood Co-Invest Fortuna-B ($40 million) and assorted co-investments ($60.3 million). On the hedge fund side, trustees heard detail on six mandates at their meeting held by teleconference this week due to concerns related to spreading the coronavirus. In total, another $655 million flowed into hedge fund strategies. The largest mandate went to Elliott Associates, managed by Paul Singer’s Elliott Management that is one of the largest activist hedge fund firms in the world. SWIB allocated $420 million to the flagship fund. Machine learning firm Voleon received an allocation of $150 million to be managed across two of its funds. Meanwhile, multi-strategy shop Davidson Kempner received $20 million. Risk premia and quant specialist firm Two Sigma received $75 million. The $7.4 billion real estate portfolio saw another $209 million in capital in the last quarter of 2019, with MetWest and the BlackChamber Real Estate Opportunity fund managing $109 million and $100 million respectively. The SWIB investment portfolio performed strongly in 2019 thanks to equity market returns. Going forward trustees were told of plans to watch closely the economic impact from COVID-19. The impact on global activity will likely play out over several quarters, trustees were told. State of Wisconsin Board alternative investments from Oct. - Dec. 2019

Wisconsin adds $1.6bn to diverse alts programs

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