[Michlib-l] Investment of Surplus Funds

[Kristina Knezic]

Thank you all for replying.  In case you are interested, below are the responses I received.
* Lately (meaning in the past four months or so) we have been purchasing Treasury bills through Huntington Bank. Right now they pay above 5% but have very short terms, from one month up to three, so the cash is never tied-up for very long.
* We also ladder our funds in CDs. Every time they come due I shop the rates myself. Our board created a list of approved banks and once I find the best rates I run it by the treasurer and we reinvest at the bank with best rate. The last time around, our current bank matched the best rate I found so you can also try to make the banks compete in your favor!
* We use GovMic through the state, which allows many different kinds of investments all accepted by the state
* We used to just keep most of our money in a non interest-bearing checking account, with some surplus funds in a CD that earned a tiny bit of interest. With rates so high right now, though, we invested in several CDs earning over 4%, plus opened a money market account at 4.5%. We seriously considered using the Michigan Class investment pool, but that is truly an investment and can lose value. We were reluctant to risk that with any funds we might need for payroll or whatever in the coming year, even though it's showing returns over 5% right now. 
* We are also using MI CLASS. 
* We invest using guidelines in PA20 http://legislature.mi.gov/doc.aspx?mcl-act-20-of-1943. We invest in triple-A rated bonds, treasuries, and some super conservative mutual funds. We have an investment firm that handles this for us. We pay a fee. If memory serves, it's around .25% of the portfolio. Our investment person ladders these out so they come due when we need them. Because of the timing of our tax receipts, we have 8 months' operating costs in our fund balance, plus any excess - that is what gets invested. 
* We use Michigan CLASS, and have been very pleased!  Their rate is good, they only work with municipalities, the investments are liquid, and the investments are completely diversified.
* MI Class https://www.michiganclass.org/ The ROI is excellent and beats out any rate you get at bank for a CD.
* We have CDs at several different local credit unions and banks.
* We are investing in laddered CDs, municipal funds and money market certificates. Our previous auditor wanted to be sure that all monies were invested in either Michigan banks or banks that had branches in MI. We do use a financial planner (somehow at no cost to us) who, when a CD is due, researches who pays the best interest rates.
* We are currently laddering CDs at various banks through Fidelity. 
* We are currently laddering CDs . With one money market mixed in and we manage it ourselves.
* TLN and many of our libraries are using MI CLASS right now, as their rate of return is 5%. Hard to beat. https://www.michiganclass.org/
* There are actually very few ways for a Michigan public library to invest.  CDs is one of the methods allowed, and that’s what we use.  We shop around to try to get the best interest rate.
* As of right now we have ours in CDs at local banks. I would like to move some of those funds to Michigan Class later this year. 
* We only do cd’s and spread them across 3 different banks. 
* We have CDs
* We have invested in some CDs.  We have a ladder approach with some short term (3 month CDs) to longer term (9 month at the most right now due to the current interest rates).  We've previously had CDS range from 9-24 months.
Kristina
 
Kristina Knezic, Director
Berrien Springs Community Library
215 W. Union St.
Berrien Sprins, MI 49103
269-471-7074
www.bsclibrary.org

> ---------- Original Message ----------
> From: Kristina Knezic <kknezic at bsclibrary.org>
> To: Michlib-l <michlib-l at mcls.org>
> Date: 07/24/2023 3:43 PM EDT
> Subject: Investment of Surplus Funds
>  
>  
> Hello All,
>  
> I know there are guidelines for investing public funds, but my Board is interested in knowing where other libraries are investing surplus funds. 
>  
> Thank you,
> Kristina
>  
> Kristina Knezic, Director
> Berrien Springs Community Library
> 215 W. Union St.
> Berrien Sprins, MI 49103
> 269-471-7074
> www.bsclibrary.org
> 
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