By: Russ Kamp, Managing Director, Ryan ALM, Inc.

Welcome to the last update for September 2024. Let’s hope that today brings at least one Mets’ win in Atlanta. It would mark quite the turnaround from where this team was on June 1st.

With regard to the PBGC’s implementation of the ARPA legislation, the efiling portal still remains temporarily closed. As a result, new applications have not been forthcoming. There are presently 22 applications with the PBGC. Sixteen of those must be acted on by November 30th.

Activity was fairly limited during the past week. There were no applications approved or denied. There was one application withdrawn. Bricklayers Pension Fund of West Virginia withdrew the initial application seeking $1.2 million for the 170 plan participants. In addition, 3 funds repaid a portion of the SFA grant received. Mid-Jersey Trucking Industry and Teamsters Local 701 Pension and Annuity Fund, the Pension Plan of the Bakery Drivers and Salesmen Local 194 and Industry Pension Fund, and the Building Material Drivers Local 436 Pension Plan each returned a portion of the overfunding due to incorrect census data. In total, the three plans returned $2.7 million from the $348.3 million received in SFA or 0.78%. To date, 17 plans have returned $142.3 million or 0.36% of the grant monies received. Lastly, there were no additional plans seeking to be added to the waitlist, which remains at 68.

Please don’t hesitate to reach out to us with any questions that you might have regarding investment strategies for the SFA assets. We are always willing to model your plan’s forecasted cash flows so that various implementations can be reviewed.