Data sourced from Dakota Marketplace, the global LP and GP intelligence platform trusted by thousands of investment professionals. Learn More | Book a Demo
An ETF sponsor sits down with a public pension’s staff. Before the meeting, the sponsor wants to know what the plan already owns, who the incumbent providers are, and whether the plan has been adding or trimming exposure. That information usually sits in 13F filings, scattered across periods and filer names. Dakota Marketplace organizes it by allocator, so a sales conversation or a product decision starts from the actual holdings.
What the data covers
Dakota Marketplace tracks ETF positions held by public pension funds, sourced from 13F filings and linked to enriched account records. The coverage reaches across US state and municipal systems and into large non-US public plans. For each pension, you can:
- See the underlying ETF holdings by public pension
- See what pensions are buying and selling across filing periods
- See which products are resonating across the channel
- See which exposures are active versus passive
- See asset class and sub-asset class breakdowns
- See funding balances on each position
- See ETF providers, so you know who holds the relationship
Because every holding sits on a Dakota account record, the ETF position appears next to the allocator’s other intelligence: contacts, consultants, investment strategies, and committee activity. You are not looking at a standalone list of tickers.
What it looks like at the account level
The same dataset shows very different programs depending on the allocator.
New York State Common Retirement Fund has one of the broadest ETF programs in the set, with positions across eight asset classes and 13 ETF providers. Holdings run from the Vanguard S&P 500 and the iShares Russell 3000 ETF to the iShares MSCI ACWI ex U.S. ETF, along with real assets and emerging market exposure. It also carries large climate-transition index positions, a useful signal for sponsors with sustainable products.
State of Wisconsin Investment Board uses ETFs across US equity, fixed income, emerging markets, and sector exposure, with 13 providers on the account. Its holdings include the iShares Russell 2000 ETF, the iShares Core 1-5 Year USD Bond ETF, the iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF, and the iShares iBoxx $ High Yield Corporate Bond ETF, as well as a position in the Harbor Human Capital Factor US Large Cap ETF. That mix of core iShares exposure and a smaller factor product is a good example of where a challenger sponsor can find an opening.
Tennessee Consolidated Retirement System is a standout for single-country emerging market ETFs, with large positions in the iShares MSCI Taiwan ETF, the iShares MSCI India ETF, and the iShares MSCI South Korea ETF. It also holds the iShares MBS ETF in fixed income. Country-level exposure is a niche, and the account shows who is buying it and at what size.
Texas Permanent School Fund leans on smart beta and US equity, anchored by the Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight ETF alongside SPDR mid and small cap products. For sponsors building alternatives to cap-weighted beta, the account shows what a large public fund has chosen instead.
California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) shows a smaller but notable use of active and climate-aware ETFs, including the iShares U.S. Carbon Transition Readiness Aware Active ETF and its world ex U.S. counterpart. It is a useful reference account for active ETF sponsors, since it shows a major US plan using the wrapper for a specific mandate.
How to read it
13F data reflects reported positions, not a plan’s full portfolio, and a position can carry forward from a prior filing period when no new filing replaces it. Treat the holdings as a reliable map of where a pension has shown up, and confirm current appetite through the rest of the account record. Movement across periods tells you more than any single snapshot does.
Use cases for ETF fundraisers
- Build targets from real exposure. Filter to pensions holding a competing or adjacent ETF in your asset class or sub-asset class, and start from plans that have already shown they buy the exposure.
- Know the incumbent before the meeting. See which provider a pension uses for a given exposure, and how large the position is, so your pitch addresses what they own today.
- Spot momentum. Pensions adding to a category are a different conversation than pensions reducing it. Buying and selling activity helps you prioritize outreach.
- Size the first ticket. Funding balances on existing positions give a grounded view of how much a plan has been willing to allocate to a single ETF.
- Separate active from passive. Find pensions already using active ETFs, which is a different audience than plans holding only index exposure.
Use cases for product development
- Find where demand is concentrated. See which products and sub-asset classes draw capital across the channel, and which are crowded.
- Identify gaps. Sub-asset class breakdowns show where pensions hold exposure through a handful of products, which can point to room for a differentiated launch.
- Benchmark against providers. Compare how your products and competitors’ are held across pensions, by provider and by balance.
- Test a thesis before launch. Check whether the plans you expect to buy a strategy already hold similar exposure, and at what size.
Public pension ETF activity is one of the clearest views of how institutional allocators use ETFs, and it is easiest to act on when it sits on the account record.
Public Pension ETF Intelligence in Dakota Marketplace
Dakota Marketplace connects 13F ETF holdings to enriched public pension accounts, so ETF fundraisers and product teams can go from a single position to every plan with the same exposure. Filter by asset class, sub-asset class, ETF provider, funding balance, and geography to build a target list or size a product opportunity.
If your next raise or launch depends on knowing who holds what, book a demo to see the holdings on live account records.
