UK - Flintshire County Council is seeking an investment manager to run a specialist £40m (€47m) hedge fund portfolio for the Clwyd Pension Fund.

The pension fund, last valued at £898.5m in March 2008, is looking to award a portfolio of fund of hedge funds or multi-strategy hedge funds to one or more managers beginning in December 2009.

A tender notice issued by the council revealed the successful managers will be expected to achieve a target return of between 3%-5% above UK three-month LIBOR- net of fees - for a fund of hedge fund, or an absolute return target of 8-15% for a multi-strategy hedge fund over a three year rolling basis.

In October 2008, the pension fund appointed seven external advisers as part of a framework agreement following the completion of its fund structure review in 2007, which included the appointment of a commodities and portable alpha manager. (See earlier IPE articles: Gloucester seeks equity manager as Clwyd picks advisers and Clwyd finds commodities and portable alpha managers)

Elsewhere, the Audit Commission for Local Authorities and the National Health Service (NHS) in England) has appointed Eversheds to provide legal services to its £476.9m pension fund.

Eversheds was awarded the legal advisory contract, valued at £150,000, over nine other applicants on the basis of a range of criteria including quality of services, knowledge and expertise and cost.

Figures from the Audit Commission's annual report for 2007/08 showed the pension fund had a deficit of £16.7m at March 2008, compared to a surplus of £39.1m at its last actuarial valuation in 2006.

The closing date for applications for the Clwyd hedge fund mandate is 3 August 2009, and further information can be obtained from Bfinance.

If you have any comments you would like to add to this or any other story, contact Nyree Stewart on + 44 (0)20 7261 4618 or email nyree.stewart@ipe.com

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