SOURCES SOUGHT
R -- INVESTMENT MANAGER
- Notice Date
- 10/20/2003
- Notice Type
- Sources Sought
- Contracting Office
- Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board, Office of Administration, Office of Administration-Procurement and Contracts, 1250 H. Street, N.W., Washington, DC, 20005
- ZIP Code
- 20005
- Solicitation Number
- TIB-RFI-04-01
- Response Due
- 11/17/2003
- Archive Date
- 11/30/2003
- Point of Contact
- Angela Allen, Contracting Officer, Phone 202-942-1693, Fax 202-942-1674,
- E-Mail Address
-
aallen@tsp.gov
- Description
- THIS IS A REQUEST FOR INFORMATION. IT IS NOT A REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL AND DOES NOT COMMIT THE GOVERNMENT TO AWARD A CON-TRACT NOW OR IN THE FUTURE. NO SOLICITATION IS AVAILABLE AT THIS TIME. The Thrift Savings Plan (TSP) is a defined contribution, retirement savings and investment plan, similar to a 401(k) plan, for civilian employees of the United States government and uniformed services members. The TSP is the largest defined contribution plan in the world, with over 3.2 million participants and over $118 billion in assets as of September 30, 2003. The Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board (FRTIB) is an independent Federal agency charged by statute with administering the TSP. The FRTIB is exploring options for adding target asset allocation funds as an investment choice for TSP participants. Depending on the information that is provided in response to this RFI, the FRTIB may decide to contract with a con-sulting firm to advise it concerning the establishment and operation of such funds. If the FRTIB then decides to establish such funds, it may decide to contract with a private sector firm to manage such funds. The FRTIB is interested in obtaining information about the establishment and operation of two types of target asset allocation funds: 1. Funds that have a predefined investment objective, i.e., with target asset allocations appropriate to the particular objective that are maintained over time. These are sometimes referred to as ?lifestyle? funds. 2. Funds that have a predefined investment time horizon, i.e., with target asset allocations that will vary as the horizon date approaches. These are sometimes referred to as "lifecycle" funds. The terms ?lifestyle funds? and ?lifecycle funds?, respec-tively, will be used in this RFI to refer to these two types of target asset allocation funds. The TSP currently has the following five investment funds, which are established by statute: The G Fund is invested in short-term nonmarketable U.S. Treasury securities that are specially issued to the TSP. The G Fund interest rate, set monthly, equals the average of market rates of return on U.S. Treasury marketable securities outstanding with four or more years to maturity. The F Fund is an index fund that tracks the Lehman Brothers U.S. Aggregate (LBA) bond index. The C Fund is an index fund that tracks the Standard and Poor?s (S&P) 500 stock index. The S Fund is an index fund that tracks the Wilshire 4500 stock index. The I Fund is an in-dex fund that tracks the EAFE (Europe, Australasia, Far East) stock index. These funds are described more fully in the booklets, ?Summary of the Thrift Savings Plan? and ?Guide to TSP Investments,? which can be downloaded from the TSP Web site, www.tsp.gov. The F, C, S, and I Funds are currently managed by Barclays Global Investors, Inc. The G Fund is managed in-house by FRTIB staff. It is the FRTIB?s current intent, if feasible, to establish lifestyle or lifecycle funds using only the current TSP investment options. In this RFI, the FRTIB is requesting information from investment management firms concerning how they manage lifestyle and/or lifecycle funds, in order to help it ad-dress the following issues: 1. How the FRTIB should proceed in evaluating whether to establish lifestyle and/or lifecycle funds for its participants and, if so, the number and types of funds it should offer, including the advantages and disadvantages of different types of funds. 2. Procedures for introducing lifestyle and/or lifecycle funds, including communications strategies for such funds. 3. Methods for choosing target asset allocation percentages for lifestyle and/or lifecycle funds. 4. The ability to use the existing TSP funds exclusively to establish and operate lifestyle and/or lifecycle funds. 5. How lifestyle and/or lifecycle funds using the existing TSP funds exclusively could be operated using a manager other than the FRTIB staff and whether any investment management firms would be interested in such an arrangement. 6. The potential fees and other costs associated with operating life-style and/or lifecycle funds by an outside manager, using the existing TSP investment funds exclusively. In order to elicit the required information, the FRTIB is requesting that each responding organization provide, within 30 days of the date of this RFI, the following: 1. Information showing that the organization meets the minimum criterion. 2. Any information that the organization believes would help the TSP address the requests made above, including, but not limited to, answers to the following questions: a. For lifestyle and lifecycle funds, respectively, how many funds are typically offered by your employee benefit plan sponsors using your funds? What are relevant trends have you observed related to such funds, such as whether plans are offering more or fewer funds, the size and types of plans offering such funds, and other similar information? b. How many lifestyle and lifecycle funds, respectively, do you recommend that your clients offer, and how are these funds distinguished from one another? c. What are the typical investments of a lifestyle fund portfolio and of a lifecycle fund portfolio that you offer? For each type of fund, how do you determine target asset allocations among these investments? Do you use specific, fixed targets or flexible ?ranges? of targets? Would you be willing to manage a fund that did not allow asset allocation flexibility within certain established ?ranges?? With respect to lifestyle funds only, if the eligible investments of the portfolio vary by risk tolerance, which portfolio investments do you generally include or exclude as risk tolerance increases/decreases? With respect to lifecycle funds only, how do your portfolio investment options vary as the investment horizon decreases? We note that the TSP's active participants range in age from approximately 20 to 70. How might this affect the number or structure of lifecycle funds that you would offer? d. Would you recommend using active or passive investments in a lifestyle or a lifecycle fund?s portfolio? Why or why not? e. Do you have performance benchmarks for lifestyle and lifecycle funds, respectively? If so, what are they? How much portfolio turnover should be expected as a result of strategic asset allocation decisions? f. What are your typical investment fee rate structures for lifestyle funds and lifecycle funds, respectively? What portion of such fees is related to management of the fund?s investments in the component funds and what portion is due to investment management fees of the underlying component funds? g. Would your firm be willing to manage a lifestyle fund or a lifecycle fund composed exclusively of the existing TSP funds? If so, what might a reasonable fee structure be for management of such a fund? h. In your experience, what methods are most effective in communicating the features of lifestyle funds or lifecycle funds to plan participants? i. What percentage of participants should we expect to participate in lifestyle funds or lifecycle funds, respectively? For such participants, what percentage of their plan assets could we expect them to put in a lifestyle or lifecycle funds? j. How effective can we expect to be in educating participants to use lifestyle funds or lifecycle funds appropriately? What measures, if any, would you suggest to reduce market timing of these funds, or to encourage appropriate inclusion of these funds in participant portfolios? The TSP in-tends to engage in further information gathering with responding organizations meeting the minimum criterion, including holding meetings with representatives of such organizations to obtain further information. MINIMUM CRITERION: The responding organization has offered one or more ?lifestyle? or ?lifecycle? funds for at least the past three years and has at least $100 million currently under management in such funds. ONE ORIGINAL AND ONE COPY OF YOUR RESPONSE MUST BE RECEIVED BY 3:30PM EST ON NOVEMBER 17, 2003. NO FAX OR EMAIL RESPONSES WILL BE ACCEPTED.
- Place of Performance
- Address: VARIOUS LOCATIONS
- Country: USA
- Country: USA
- Record
- SN00454852-W 20031022/031020213636 (fbodaily.com)
- Source
-
FedBizOpps.gov Link to This Notice
(may not be valid after Archive Date)
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