The Options Clearing Corporation and eSecLending announced today that they collaborated with CalPERS to develop a product to help OCC diversify and increase their committed liquidity resources while offering a compelling risk-adjusted return for CalPERS. The fully collateralized facility offers the OCC, the world's largest equity derivatives clearing organization, a source of timely access to liquidity while maintaining CalPERS' conservative risk profile.
"CalPERS conducted an extensive due diligence process on the facility and are delighted to have established a solution that achieves incremental risk-adjusted returns for our pensioners," said Curtis Ishii, Head of Global Fixed Income at CalPERS.
"The diversification of OCC's committed lenders to include CalPERS in addition to our existing base of banks and broker-dealers ensures that sufficient capacity is maintained at all times, which is critical to central counterparties like OCC," said Craig Donohue, OCC Executive Chairman. "Expanding our liquidity resource pool to draw on non-bank facilities allows OCC to meet payment obligations to clearing members in a timely way, thus promoting the uninterrupted flow of financial markets," he said.
eSecLending is the administrative agent for the facility and supports CalPERS with all aspects of the transaction. "We are proud to have expanded our product offering to CalPERS and to help the OCC diversify and increase their committed liquidity resources. The collateralized facility offers CalPERS an attractive yield within a tightly controlled operating environment and addresses the OCC's desire to establish right way risk in their funding sources," said Chris Poikonen, Executive Vice President at eSecLending.
About CalPERS - CalPERS is the largest public pension fund in the U.S., with approximately $300 billion in assets. CalPERS administers health and retirement benefits on behalf of 3,090 public school, local agency, and state employers. There are more than 1.6 million members in the CalPERS retirement system and more than 1.3 million in its health plans. For more information about CalPERS, visit www.CalPERS.ca.gov.
About eSecLending - eSecLending is an independent global securities lending agent providing customized securities lending, auction and collateral management solutions for institutional investors worldwide. The company's innovative approach has introduced investment management practices to the securities lending industry, offering beneficial owners a compelling alternative to traditional pooled lending programs. Their differentiated process facilitates best execution by utilizing a transparent, disciplined and repeatable process to determine their clients' optimal securities lending strategy. In addition to outperformance, their approach provides clients with greater transparency and control, allowing them to more effectively monitor and mitigate risks. For more information, visit www.eseclending.com.