Edward Siedle: Alternative Investment Looting Is Destroying Pension Funds

Alternative Investment Looting Is Destroying Pension Funds

By Edward Siedle, Contributor 

Forbes 

May 21, 2021 

Forensic investigations in Rhode Island, North Carolina, Kentucky and Ohio reveal that gambling 30 percent or more on high-cost, high-risk, secretive alternative investments has exposed pensions to massively greater risks and reduced net returns. The time is ripe for legislators, regulators, and law enforcement to act to stop the looting. 

A recent New York Times article revealed that putting more than half of the $62 billion Pennsylvania state teachers’ retirement fund’s assets into risky alternative investments hadn’t worked out well for the pension and had spurred an investigation by the FBI. The FBI is investigating reporting fraud—returns allegedly falsified to avoid increased worker contributions to the pension. 

Law enforcement investigations into public pension funds that lie about their returns are long, long overdue.

Click here to read the entire article on the Forbes website.

[Spoiler alert: "...all pensions lie about their investment performance."]