NEW YORK (AP) — New York City’s giant pension funds have decided to stop doing business with the paid middlemen known as placement agents.
City Comptroller Scott Stringer announced Monday that the trustees of the city’s five pension funds have voted to bar the agents from involvement in any future investment. Previously, they were banned only from the funds’ private equity investments.
Stringer took office in January. He oversees the $150 billion in city employee pension funds.
Placement agents connect pension funds with investment managers. Some in the industry say the intermediaries do a valuable job by helping smaller money management firms compete with bigger rivals.
But the agents’ role has come under scrutiny in states including New York. State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli banned placement agents from state pension fund transactions in 2009.
