TSP Investors Getting More Conservative

The losses in the stock markets from 2000 to the present have brought a significant shift in TSP investor behavior. At the start of 2001 89 percent of investors had at least some of their investment money outside the ultrasafe government securities (G) fund. As of the end of June of this year, though, 16 percent of investors in the Civil Service Retirement System and 20 percent of those in the FERS system are invested only in the G fund-and an unknown number of the others are invested only in the G fund and the bond (F) fund, which carries some market risk but far less than that of the TSP’s three stock-oriented funds. As of end of 2000, investors had 33 percent of their money overall in the G fund, 63 percent in the C fund and 4 percent in the F fund. Of the $100 billion in the TSP as of the end of June, 44 percent was in the G fund, 45 percent in the C fund and 9 percent in the F fund. The small capitalization (S) and international stock (I) funds launched last May held 1.5 and 0.5 percent of TSP balances, respectively.