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Micronesia Conservation Trust links up with Citi to help manage its funds
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Posted on Oct 03 2008
[B]HAGATNA, Guam[/B]—The Micronesia Conservation Trust has appointed Citi Smith Barney to provide investment consulting and custody services to the MCT Endowment Fund.
The Asia Pacific Group, headed by senior institutional consultant Daniel A. Roland, CIMA, of the Hagatna, Guam office, will provide the specialized advice tailored to the organization with the investment consulting services available through Consulting Group, the managed account division of Citi Smith Barney.
The MCT is a regional organization chartered under Federated States of Micronesia laws to support biodiversity conservation and related sustainable development for the people of Micronesia.
Created in 2002, MCT is the only Micronesia-based organization set up to provide long-term, sustained funding to community-based organizations and other non-governmental organizations through a grants program.
The MCT is working to mobilize funding from a variety of public and private sources to build an endowment of US $20 million to provide long-term support for sustainable biodiversity resource management in Micronesia.
“The global investment environment presents significant challenges and opportunities to institutional investors like the Micronesia Conservation Trust,” said Roland.
He said his Guam-based team uses the published research and analysis of Consulting Group to help institutional clients develop investment strategies focused on achieving long-term goals.
Aren Palik, board vice chairman and chairman of the Investment Committee said: “With the specialized tools and resources provided by Consulting Group, we will now be well-equipped to develop investment policy statements, determine asset allocation strategies, select appropriate investment management firms, conduct disciplined rebalancing strategies and monitor our Fund’s results over time.”
Palik pointed out “a major concern of the board of trustees was the safety of the MCT Fund, especially in these times of financial instability among financial institutions. We felt that the combination of insurance safeguards, and the most secure capital structure offered by Citi, made them by far the most secure choice as custodian of our assets”. [B][I](Citi)[/I][/B]
