Texas Teachers Beefs Up Its RE, PE and Infrastructure Allocations 

The Teachers Retirement System of Texas continued to build up its real estate, private equity and infrastructure investment exposure across six funds. The roughly $184 billion pension fund has a roughly $99 billion exposure to private markets overall and put $6.2 billion to work in alternative assets last year. 

The pension fund contributed $100 million to Pennybacker Capital’s latest flagship fund Pennybacker VI, an opportunistic real estate fund. The fund also invested $50 million in the Pennybacker Income and Growth Fund in January 2022. Other investors in the latest Pennybacker fund include the Texas Municipal Employees’ Retirement System.   

An additional $100 million was allocated to infrastructure with I Squared Capital Advisors for its ISQ Co-Investment Fund (TX). Last year, Texas Teachers allocated $100 million to another I Squared infrastructure offering – ISQ Growth Markets Infrastructure Fund (UST) LP. 

Two new managers were chosen for the private equity portfolio – General Catalyst Group Management and Valeas Capital Partners Management. The General Catalyst XI fund received $25 million to invest in seed, early-stage and late-stage companies, while Valeas’ Sherman Opportunity received $50 million.  

The largest private equity commitment of $175 million went to TA Associates’ TA XV-A, which was launched in 2022. The TA flagship strategy is a combination of buyout and growth equity investments. 

Pictured: TRS headquarters in Austin, TX