Ex-CalPERS PE chief Desrochers joins Asia’s CITIC PE

Real Desrochers, former private equity chief at California Public Employees’ Retirement System, joined CITIC Private Equity Funds Management Co as a managing director, according to sources.

Desrochers updated his LinkedIn profile recently to indicate he started in the new role in April. It’s not clear exactly what Desrochers will focus on or whether he is relocating to Asia. No one returned a request for comment sent to a general email address at CITIC PE. Desrochers did not respond to a comment request over LinkedIn.

Desrochers left CalPERS in April after running the system’s $45 billion PE portfolio since 2011. He left the largest public pension system in the U.S. at a time when CalPERS was taking outside criticism around PE for not fully accounting for the costs of the program, including tracking how much carried interest it paid out to its PE managers. The system provided that tally, $3.4 billion since program inception in 1990, in 2015.

Desrochers has experience as a limited partner outside the U.S. Prior to CalPERS, he was chief investment officer at Sanabil Investments in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

CITIC PE was formed in 2008 by Lefei Liu, former chief investment officer of China Life Insurance Co. Liu’s father is Liu Yunshan, chief of the Communist Party’s propaganda and ideology group and known as the No. 5 person in the party’s hierarchy, according to media reports.

The firm has offices in Beijing and Hong Kong. CITIC PE focuses on buyouts in technology and internet, industry and energy, finance and business services, consumer and leisure and medical and health.

The firm closed CPE China Fund II with about $1.3 billion in 2015, according to Palico.

Action Item: Check out CITIC PE’s Form ADV here: http://bit.ly/2gDOdpE

Archived photo of Real Desrochers courtesy of CalPERS