DENMARK - Laerernes, the DKK24bn (€3.8bn) industrywide fund for teachers, is looking for a hard currency emerging market debt manager.

The mandate is for US$50m although that sum is likely to increase over the coming years.
Laerernes has three emerging market debt mandates: one in local currencies, one in a mixture of local and hard; and one in hard debt.

All told, the mandates are worth US$180m and are likely to grow.

Because of exposure to local currencies in the first two mandates, the fund is keen to restrict the third portfolio to hard currency issuance.

But Anders Bertramsen, portfolio manager at Laerernes, said he had already discussed with potential applicants the possibility of giving them some latitude on presenting a track record that included local currency performance.

The incumbent manager is invited to retender. Anders Bertramsen, portfolio manager at Laerernes, said that it was a review to see what was available in the market but if all tenders were of a similar quality, the incumbent manager would retain the brief. Laerernes is not keen to pay out unnecessary transitioning costs.

The fund typically uses a local administrator to create a suitable wrapper for such mandates. The successful manager is then employed as a sub-adviser, without any need for recognition by the local financial regulator.

The mandate's benchmark will be JP Morgan EMBI Global Diversified Index. Closing date for applications is March 6.