Alaska pension re-ups with Neuberger Berman

The Alaska Retirement Management Board has continued its backing of Neuberger Berman‘s secondaries funds with another commitment to the firm’s Secondary Opportunities Fund series.

The pension fund committed $50 million to the New York-headquartered firm’s NB Secondary Opportunities Fund IV (SOF IV), according to a board memo dated 19 May.

SOF IV launched in April and City of Milwaukee Employees Retirement System has committed $25 million to the fund, according to PEI Research & Analytics.

It was not clear what the fund’s target is and a spokeswoman for Neuberger Berman did not return a request for comment by press time.

SOF IV’s predecessor, the 2012-vintage Secondary Opportunities Fund III, beat its $1.6 billion target and closed on $2 billion after 19 months of fundraising. Alaska RMB had previously committed to that fund.

Neuberger Berman enjoys limited competition due to its focus on single asset purchases in the mid-market and proactive deal sourcing, the memo notes. It adds that the firms two previous funds have strong returns which are top quartile when compared with both other secondaries funds and primary private equity funds.

SOF I, II and III have an average annual cash distribution yield of 20 percent or more, according to the memo.

Alaska RMB allocates 6.3 percent of its $29 billion investment portfolio to private equity. The pension fund’s other secondaries commitments include $50 million to Lexington Partners’ 2014-vintage Lexington Capital Partners VIII, according to PEI data.