CalPERS awards 1st Europe emerging manager mandate

LONDON Dec 1 (Reuters) - British fund firm Sourcecap said on Monday it had won a $150 million equities mandate in the first European brief awarded by giant U.S. pension scheme CalPERS as part of its emerging manager programme.

The California Public Employees' Retirement System (CalPERS) has two Manager Development Programmes designed to tap fresh fund talent where the lack of track record might have otherwise impeded investment.

Smaller funds able to move in and out of positions more nimbly than their larger counterparts can in consequence generate higher returns, other things being equal.

New investment mandates have been scarce during the financial crisis, but large pension schemes such as CalPERS continue to search for new opportunities to diversify their portfolios and generate returns.

CalPERS currently has $1.8 billion invested in 10 emerging firms as part of its manager development programmes.

The new mandate will be run in the Sourcecap European Alpha fund, a long-only large and mid-cap equities fund.

"Sourcecap is a very promising emerging firm," said Anne Stausboll, CalPERS interim chief investment officer.

CalPERS is one of the world's largest pension schemes, with $175 billion in funds under management. (Reporting by James Molony, editing by Will Waterman)