Slocum Adopts RiskFirst's PFaroe

The Minneapolis-based firm joins several other major advisories in upgrading its analytics, following a trend both in the US and Europe of pensions pursuing more sophisticated strategies and requirements around liabilities and risk.

“We will always strive to be a firm that takes a big picture or qualitative view of the market when setting long-term asset allocation strategy for our retirement plan clients," says Nicole Delahanty, Principal at Slocu. "But a dynamic pension landscape also calls for the ability to view pension risk on a frequent basis – we need to stress-test our views and ensure that they meet the needs of our clients from a funded status, cash and expense perspective. PFaroe is an important addition to our toolkit, allowing us to evaluate clients’ risk from multiple perspectives and to perform real-time scenario stress-testing. More and more of our clients are also implementing liability-driven investment (LDI) or de-risking programs, particularly those with frozen plans who want to reduce funded status volatility as their funded status improves. To do this efficiently and effectively, we need a robust and real-time system."

“It is clear that de-risking is swiftly moving up the agenda for US pension plans, large and small, and we are delighted that the industry is turning to real-time analytics to improve efficiency and effectiveness of such solutions," adds Matthew Seymour, managing director at RiskFirst. "Slocum is a firm that takes a highly customised approach to developing asset allocation and risk management for clients, which marries perfectly with PFaroe’s holistic and flexible approach.”

More and more of our clients are implementing liability-driven investment (LDI) or de-risking programs, particularly those with frozen plans who want to reduce funded status volatility as their funded status improves. To do this efficiently and effectively, we need a robust and real-time system. - Nicole Delahanty, Slocum