(Bloomberg) — – U.S. city and county pensions had 73 percent of assets required to meet obligations to retirees in fiscal 2013, up from 69 percent in the prior year, according to Wilshire Consulting.
Funding levels for more than 100 retirement systems reviewed by Santa Monica, California-based Wilshire rose faster than liabilities, narrowing the combined gap to $160.7 billion from $176.9 billion.
"Global stock markets rallied strongly over the 12 months ended June 30, 2013, offsetting weaker performance by global fixed income," Wilshire said today in a news release.
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Of the 105 city and county systems that reported data for 2013, 90 percent are underfunded, Wilshire said.
City and county pensions have a 62.4 percent average allocation to equities, including real estate and private equity, with 37.6 percent devoted to debt and other assets, Wilshire said.
For the 105 systems that reported actuarial data on or after June 30, 2013, pension assets were $429 billion, a gain of 11 percent from the prior year, Wilshire said. Liabilities grew 5 percent to $590 billion.
Wilshire forecasts a long-term annual median return on city and county pension assets of 6.6 percent, below the median assumption of 7.75 percent.
To contact the reporter on this story: Martin Z. Braun in New York at [email protected]
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