Mass. Fund Brings Putnam Back into the Fold

October 5, 2004 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - Almost a year after firing the scandal-plagued Putnam Investments, the Massachusetts pension fund board on Tuesday tapped Putnam to manage $250 million in small-cap stocks.

The Boston-based asset manager was one of four companies to win a mandate to manage small-cap stocks for the state’s $32-billion pension fund,  Reuters reported. The state fired Putnam from managing $1.74 billion of US and international stocks October 30 after state and federal regulators accused Putnam managers and some clients of improper and frequent mutual-fund trading (See  PA, RI, VT, IA, NY Pensions Fire Putnam ).

California officials recently announced that Putnam was once again eligible to bid on the Golden State’s pension fund business. (See  Putnam Back in Business with CalPERS, CalSTRS).

 

The California officials made the move after Putnam agreed to a number of reform measures.  California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) and the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) fired Putnam from their combined $1.5 billion investment mandates.

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