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    Corporate Pension Plans

    Overview

    We have partnered with many of the world’s leading corporate pension plans to help them meet their investment goals. We take a holistic view of each plan and collaborate with clients to build tailored solutions that meet their unique needs—from liability management and advisory solutions to plan design and asset allocation.

    Our Approach: How We Partner with Clients

    We help corporate pension plans navigate shifting market and regulatory dynamics that impact both their existing asset allocations and long-term investment strategies. Through our longstanding relationships, we are able to identify relevant market trends and provide thoughtful, timely and innovative solutions.

    Deep Pension Expertise
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    Our dedicated pension research and insightful thought leadership have made us a leader in the corporate pension space. A deep understanding of our clients’ balance sheet risks coupled with extensive experience in the space enables us to provide recommendations tailored to our clients’ specific objectives.

    Broad Investing Capabilities
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    From bespoke alternative investment solutions to long-duration fixed income and liability-orientated strategies, the breadth of the GSAM platform allows us to support our clients’ strategy across the investment spectrum.

    Customized Advisory Solutions
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    Our vast array of capabilities allows us to build tailored solutions that range from implementing glide paths to providing holistic advisory solutions. We work directly with organizations and their staffs, investment committees, actuaries and consultants to help meet our clients’ goals.

    Examples of Our Partnership with Clients

    Client Description

    A large multi-national with pension plans in several jurisdictions.

     

    Client Objective

    The client was seeking a strategic partner to assist them in developing a more holistic, liability-oriented investment strategy. The client had developed a glide path and had hit a number of funded status triggers, increasing the allocation to liability-driven investments (LDI) to approximately 60%. The client had several active long-duration fixed income managers and was seeking a completion manager to ensure the total LDI portfolio matched its liability risk exposures.
    GSAM Solution

    We were hired to serve as an anchor fixed income manager. We maintained a role within the active long-duration roster and completed the LDI portfolio to a customized liability benchmark based on accounting cash flows and discount rate methodology. We continue to serve the client as a strategic partner, as they work through various de-risking exercises, such as rebalancing the long-duration managers based on desired target allocations, raising cash for benefit payments as needed and serving as the outsourcing / fiduciary manager for one of its international pension plans.
    Client Description

    A leading mobile & telecom multi-national with a legacy US pension obligation representing a substantial portion of the organization’s market capitalization. 

    Client Objective

    The client had frozen its US pension plan to new entrants and future accruals, and was seeking support as they embarked on a large scale pension plan restructuring with an increased focus on liability-driven investing (LDI). The client needed assistance in developing a more diversified strategic asset allocation for remaining pension plan assets, 

    and structuring a retiree buy-out and lump sum offer to terminated vested participants.

     

    GSAM Solution

    We worked with the client to carve out assets for use in the transaction, and ran scenarios to determine the value of held bonds given a tradeoff between (a) maximizing the insurance discount and (b) hedging versus the roll-forward. In addition to managing the annuitized plan pre-transfer, and developing a derivative overlay to mitigate the market risk between the roll-forward index and the amount to be delivered to the insurer, we served as the Outsourced Chief Investment Officer (OCIO) and implemented a modernized LDI program to revamp its growth portfolio.

    Related Strategies

    Equity
    Fixed Income
    Alternatives
    Multi-Asset
    Pension Solutions
    Outsourced CIO
    ESG and Impact Investing
    Liquidity Solutions

    Related Insights

    July 2019

    US Corporate Pension Mid-Year Update: Eyeing the Exit

    June 2019

    Waxing Life Expectancies, Waning Return Assumptions

    May 2019

    US Corporate Pension De-Risking: More Than Just Bonds

    For more information, please contact a GSAM relationship manager.