CalPERS Calls for Targeting Homeland Threats

December 17, 2002 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - The California Public Employees' Retirement System (CalPERS) is asking the US government to deny companies posing a risk to national security access to US capital markets, according to a Dow Jones report.

The $128 billion CalPERs, largest public pension fund in the US, approved a letter to be sent to Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge and Treasury Secretary John Snow to prevent what CalPERS refers to as, “unwittingly supporting terrorist activities or other hostile threats” through its investments.

Concluding that private-sector groups do not have the expertise to provide credible information about corporate “bad actors”, CalPERS is calling on US intelligence, military, diplomatic and financial regulatory bodies to monitor and report on companies that threaten US security.  

In the letter, CalPERS Chief Investment Officer said, “we respectfully request that your department, working in concert with other appropriate federal agencies, identify such companies and deny them access to US capital markets and restrict any US person from making foreign investments in them.”

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