US - TCW has sued its former investment chief Jeffrey Gundlach for allegedly stealing proprietary information in order to form his own firm, DoubleLine Capital, and alleged Gundlach stored pornographic materials and drugs at work.

IRELAND - The country's €22.3bn (US$32bn) National Pension Reserve Fund (NPRF) returned 20.9% last year on the back of rising equity markets, the National Treasury Management Agency said.

UK - Aberdeen has acquired £13.5bn (US$21.6bn) of long-only multi-manager and fund of hedge fund assets from RBS Asset Management for £84.7m.

US -California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger equated the state's rising pension costs to a "locomotive" and pledged to make pension reform a priority in 2010 in his annual State of the State address yesterday.

GLOBAL - TCW's purchase of Metropolitan West Asset Management may be a predictor of things to come as independent firms will drive merger and acquisition activity in 2010, investment bank Jefferies said.

US - Denver-based asset manager Janus Capital Group has hired Richard Weil from rival PIMCO as its chief executive officer.

ROMANIA - Romania's mandatory pension system returned 17.7% in 2009 while the voluntary system boasted returns of 15.9%, figures by the Romanian Pension Fund Association (APAPR) showed.

CANADA - The Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan (OTPP) has led a group of investors in the acquisition of American International Group's (AIG) Canadian mortgage insurance business, OTPP said.

US - TCW Group announced it has withdrawn from the government's programme to invest in toxic bank assets following a staff exodus at the bond asset manager.

AUSTRALIA/SOUTH KOREA - South Korea's National Pension Service, the nation's biggest investor, bought an office building in Sydney for A$685m (US$626m) to diversify its investments as Australia's economy strengthens.