The same year California power broker Gerald Parsky hired placement agent Alfred Villalobos to win business deals from CalPERS, Villalobos organized a nonprofit company in Nevada that listed Parsky as its president.
But Villalobos – a former CalPERS board member now at the center of an investigation into possible influence peddling – now says Parsky wasn't an officer with the Nevada company. In papers filed with the Nevada secretary of state, Villalobos said Parsky was mistakenly listed as president of the Capital Markets Advisory Council, which was founded in 2005. Its incorporation papers described Capital Markets as a think tank devoted to pension issues.
Villalobos' extraordinary success at winning CalPERS investment deals for top-drawer clients like Parsky – plus his connections to top Cal-PERS officials – have triggered an internal investigation and prompted the pension fund to sponsor legislation cracking down on placement agents. Villalobos has earned $59 million in commissions pitching investments to the California Public Employees' Retirement System since leaving its board in 1995.
Parsky, a prominent Republican who was appointed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2007 to lead a study of California's public pensions, said he didn't know the Nevada nonprofit existed until Nov. 6, some five years after it was incorporated. After learning of its existence, Parsky "promptly requested Mr. Villalobos to remove Mr. Parsky's name as an officer," a spokesman said.
Villalobos also filed papers saying he had erroneously listed Christopher Bower, head of a La Jolla investment firm that manages more than $600 million for CalPERS, as a trustee of the Nevada nonprofit.
A Bower spokesman, Dan Hilley, said Bower had held discussions with Villalobos several years ago about forming the nonprofit "but nothing ever came of it. … The thing never really got off the ground."
Last month, Villalobos dissolved the nonprofit. The dissolution filing listed Villalobos as the sole officer of Capital Markets. He couldn't be reached for comment.
Parsky's firm, Aurora Capital Group of Los Angeles, has paid Villalobos some $5.9 million for securing two investments from CalPERS totaling $550 million.
Bower's firm, Pacific Corporate Group, has been advising CalPERS on investments for 20 years. Bower hired Villalobos in 2007 to ask Cal-PERS and other institutions to buy stock in Pacific Corporate. CalPERS turned down the offer, and Villalobos earned no commission.
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