By Anastasia Donde
After some embarrassing missteps, including investments in the high-profile blowup of Amaranth Advisors and the allegedly fraudulent Westridge Capital, and losing money on its portable alpha program, the San Diego County Employees Retirement Association is getting its act together.
Though the $7.3 billion pension hasn't taken its losses lightly—it filed a lawsuit to recover the roughly $150 million it lost in Amaranth—it also hasn't wasted any time revamping its approach to hedge funds. (The Amaranth suit was recently thrown out of court, though the pension did recover $61 million in liquidation payments. SDCERA's chief executive, Brian White, says the pension will appeal the ruling.)
In August the firm replaced former in-house chief investment officer David Deutsch, who resigned in March 2009, with former Teacher Retirement System of Texas deputy chief investment officer Lee Partridge. The decision to hire Partridge was a novel choice for...