How We Invest: Time-Tested Investing Principles

We Stick to Our Investment Objectives
At TIAA-CREF, time-tested principles are the foundation of our competitive track record. We believe that providing pure exposure to a variety of market segments is an essential part of our role. It means that you can use our funds and accounts in your own portfolio without worrying whether style drift will interfere with your asset allocation strategy or produce undesired overlap that can significantly increase your risk level.

We Understand the Value of Remaining Fully Invested and the Importance of Lower Fees
Market advances often occur in concentrated periods that are very difficult to predict. With that in mind, each of our portfolios seeks to remain fully invested, rather than hold a cash reserve as a hedge. We believe this is the only way to take advantage of every upward move of the market. Controlling expenses is also essential for consistent, long-term growth, and low expenses have always been an important part of our strategy. Our fees are less than half the mutual fund industry average.*

We Provide a Wider Range of Products for Broadly Diversified Portfolios
While many other investment companies only offer their investors a choice of products that invest in stocks and bonds, TIAA-CREF also offers its retirement plan participants access to directly-owned commercial real estate through the TIAA Real Estate Account — an asset class usually only available to institutions and high-net-worth investors.

We Have Experience Across Major Asset Classes
We have been investing in the fixed-income marketplace since 1918. We made our first real estate investments in 1947. In 1952, we pioneered the use of equity investments as a way of building retirement assets. In 1973, we began diversifying our equity holdings to include foreign stocks. Today, this depth of experience across asset classes makes TIAA-CREF one of the world’s most highly regarded institutional investors.

Next: Equity Investing