(December 20, 2012) — Total assets under management by public pension funds in the US are now the highest they’ve been in four years, according to new data from the US Census Bureau.
The 100 largest retirement systems—representing 89.4% of total public plan assets—managed $2.79 trillion as of the third quarter’s close on September 30. Plan assets haven’t been this substantial since the second quarter of 2008. Between June 30, 2007 and the end of March in 2009, public pension portfolios lost nearly a trillion dollars, or one third of their value.
Another marked change since 2008: public funds are holding much less of their money in mortgages. This figure did in fact jump from $9.4 billion to $11.6 billion between the second and third quarter this year, but is still much lower than the $18.1 billion invested at the close of 2007.
Public pensions investment teams returned a total of $107.97 billion in 2012’s third quarter. This is much better than last quarter, when funds lost $16.3 billion on their investments. The opening quarter of this year was one of the strongest ever, with public pensions adding $179.32 billion in assets through investments alone.
Earlier this year, Census figures showed public plans had been socking away their growing assets in Treasury bonds. Funds were, in aggregate, allocating the largest portion of their portfolio to federal government securities since the third quarter of 2004.
This data comes from the Census Bureau’s Quarterly Survey of Public Pensions. A panel of the 100 largest public defined benefit pension funds in the US provide data on their own revenues, expenditures, and asset allocation for the survey.
Related article: The Messy Interior of a Public Pension