Investment Legal And Compliance Counsel
CurrentAs MOSERS’s investment legal and compliance counsel, I am primarily responsible for overseeing the system’s hiring and ongoing due diligence of its institutional investment managers. As such, I conduct investment, legal, and qualitative due diligence into a broad range of alternative investment classes, including hedge funds, private equity, and real estate.The due diligence I conduct includes a full examination of a manager and its offering. This entails a conventional analysis of the rights and duties contained within the operative documents. As necessary, I examine portfolio investments as well. I then report that analysis to stakeholders, summarizing the legal risks and highlighting possible scenarios.My review goes beyond a mere legal analysis of the manager's offering. Using research, databases, and open-source techniques, I identify other risks (such as headline or policy risk) and verify and cross-check claims where possible. Further, my review also examines whether the managers’ policies are sufficient to comply with statutes designed to prevent money laundering and terrorist funding, such as the USA PATRIOT Act. I also monitor for compliance with applicable sanctions laws, for instance, the various lists promulgated by U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS).Additionally, I advise on legal developments affecting the investment managers, such as statutory or regulatory changes. I also monitor and report on legal trends or geopolitical events that may affect the system’s investments.