Calor Group Retirement Benefits Plan has appointed Goldman Sachs Asset Management (GSAM) as fiduciary manager to handle its £240m (€290m) assets on behalf of Calor Gas’s UK defined benefit (DB) pension scheme.

Calor Gas – a UK-based liquefied petroleum gas supplier – appointed GSAM replacing Cardano, according to the fund’s latest statement of investment principles.

The plan’s trustee, Calor Pension Trust, appointed its new fiduciary manager following a competitive tender process overseen by Barnett Waddingham, with the plan having been under external fiduciary management since 2019.

This latest agreement follows the trend of pension schemes reviewing their current arrangements following the liability-driven investments (LDI) crisis and considering the right partner for the later stages of their journey plan, with a focus on end-game solutions.

As fiduciary manager of the scheme, GSAM will draw upon its strong advisory, LDI hedging and risk management capabilities as well as its alternative asset investment expertise.

Roger Mattingly, chair of trustees of the scheme, said: “Goldman Sachs Asset Management demonstrated a clear understanding of the trustee’s objectives and the best path forward for the plan, which gave us the confidence in their ability to support us through this important transition.”

He added that the manager’s ability to offer a “huge degree” of customisation, combined with the expertise in onboarding the plan’s assets from another fiduciary manager, “particularly with the complexity of our LDI and private markets portfolio”, has been “invaluable”.

“We have been impressed by the strength and breadth of GSAM’s investment platform, which spans multiple key areas essential to the next phase of the Plan’s journey,” Mattingly noted.

Christy Jesudasan, co-head of UK and Ireland institutional business at GSAM, said: “Our approach to fiduciary management is underpinned by extensive risk management experience, driven by a focus on building strong partnerships with our clients.

“We are responsible for managing the assets of schemes of all sizes, drawing on our scale, depth and range of investment expertise, and bespoke approach to meet each client’s needs.”

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Pamela is IPE's UK correspondent. Before joining IPE in May 2023, she spent five years writing about the insurance industry. During her career so far she won awards for Most Promising Newcomer in 2020 and Best Investigative Article in 2022 from the British Insurance Brokers Association, and was also highly commended at the WTW Media Awards for Insurance Features Journalist of The Year.View full Profile

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