Posted on 02/24/2010 9:33:41 AM PST by NormsRevenge
CalPERS says it has lost $475 million on an investment that yielded controversial placement agent and former CalPERS board member Alfred Villalobos his biggest single payday.
The loss is based on June 30 figures and appears to have shrunk somewhat in the months since. Because the loss is still on paper, it could rebound some more before CalPERS chooses to sell it. ..
The pension fund said its equity investment in New York financial giant Apollo Global Management had fallen to an estimated $124.6 million as of last June, the latest figures available. Cal-PERS paid $600 million for the investment in mid-2007, gaining a 9 percent equity stake in the firm.
The deal yielded Villalobos his biggest commission yet recorded, according to CalPERS records: $13.2 million.
That represents more than one-fifth of all the $59 million in commissions Villalobos has earned from CalPERS deals since leaving the pension fund's board in 1995. He has made far more than any other placement agent who's represented clients in front of CalPERS.
Villalobos is at the heart of an in-house inquiry CalPERS launched last fall into the activities of placement agents – middlemen hired by private equity firms like Apollo to help them obtain investments from public pension funds. CalPERS backs legislation that would ban commission payments and require agents to register as lobbyists.
Asked about Villalobos' role in the Apollo investment, CalPERS spokesman Brad Pacheco noted that the probe is still under way. ..
Judging the value of the Apollo equity stake is difficult. The investment doesn't trade publicly. But shares trade sporadically on a private exchange run by Goldman Sachs. The most recent trades, from December, would put Cal-PERS' shares at about $180 million. A spokeswoman said Apollo would have no comment on CalPERS' estimate.
(Excerpt) Read more at sacbee.com ...
ping
Of Goldman Sachs, By Goldman Sachs, For Goldman Sachs.
Systemic? How many more states and fed. pension money will be bailed out on our backs through a back-door vampire fraud bill, attempted to be labeled as, “healthcare.?”
I just hope there is some money left when I retire.
I’ve suspected for 6 months that the reason Bambi was pushing healthcare was to bail out the losses in PERS caused by the 2008 financial collapse.
By dumping all the PERS employees onto the Fed, all the underfunded pension plans move out of the current danger zone.
I just can’t prove it yet.
I wonder how the “politically correct” Calpers investments are coming along? How about those “green” investments Calpers?
Goldman Sachs and the New York Fed run this country.
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