CalPERS Up 0.61% On Year, Happy to Beat Benchmarks

The recent returns at the $302 billion California Public Employees' Retirement System (CalPERS) might seem slight at 0.61% for the twelve months ended June 30. But over a difficult market environment for investors, where the S&P 500 basically marched in place, those returns don’t seem as dismal.

A year of beating benchmarks doesn't meet asset growth goals

CalPERs has had an active past few years, indeed. In 2014, after putting to bed a pay for play investment scandal, the fund eventually shed itself of hedge fund investments in a very public fashion.

Then, after reporting a paltry 2.4% year over year returns in 2015 – when the S&P 500 was...