# Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina Retirement Plan Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina Retirement Plan is a Pension Fund based in Durham, United States. ## Overview - **Organization type:** Pension Fund - **Headquarters:** Durham, United States - **Region:** North America - **Address:** Durham, NC, United States - **Founded:** 1933 - **Assets under management:** Undisclosed - **Website:** www.bluecrossnc.com - **LinkedIn:** https://www.linkedin.com/company/bluecrossnc ## Regulatory record - **Reports private funds:** No ## About The Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina Retirement Plan is the corporate pension vehicle for the state's dominant health insurer, an independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association. The plan sits inside Blue Cross NC, a Durham-based nonprofit with roughly 5,000 employees and a closed defined-benefit structure. A Board of Trustees chaired by Edward L. Curran oversees the plan, while day-to-day investment management runs through the office of CFO Mitch Perry and Director of Investments Nicholas Chiarello. The plan's investment committee draws on the parent company's executive leadership, including CEO Tunde Sotunde, and historically on the governance expertise of First Citizens Bank CEO Frank B. Holding, Jr., who served as Board Chairman. The plan's most distinctive allocation is a dedicated timberland portfolio within the United States — a real-asset sleeve that sets it apart from the generic 60/40 corporate pension model. This timber exposure functions as an inflation hedge and a diversifier with biological growth characteristics uncorrelated to financial markets. The exact target weights remain undisclosed, consistent with the limited public transparency typical of single-sponsor corporate plans. No named fund commitments or co-investment partners appear in the public record. Headquartered solely in Durham, the plan is administered by Blue Cross NC's internal treasury and finance function. The parent organization, an independent nonprofit licensee of the national Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, participates actively in the North Carolina Chamber of Commerce, providing the investment staff with embedded access to regional economic intelligence and business networks. The plan maintains no separately branded investment entity, no affiliated venture arm, and no multi-employer pooled structure. A related philanthropic vehicle — the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina Foundation — operates as a separate 501(c)(3) grantmaking entity focused on health equity, and there is no evidence of commingled assets or program-related investing between the foundation and the pension plan. What distinguishes this plan structurally is the combination of a single-sponsor corporate charter with an explicitly disclosed natural-resource allocation. The absence of public pension-style transparency requirements means the plan can operate with minimal external scrutiny, adjusting its illiquid allocations without the disclosure obligations that constrain state and municipal funds. Former Board Chairman Frank Holding's presence connects the plan to one of the largest regional banking franchises in the Southeast, a governance channel that may inform credit-market views and manager selection. ## Sectors - Timberland - Real Assets ## People - Tunde Sotunde — CEO of Blue Cross NC and Board Trustee - Mitch Perry — CFO of Blue Cross NC and member of the Investment Committee - Nicholas G. Chiarello — Director of Investments and Assistant Treasurer - Edward L. (Ned) Curran — Chairman of the Board of Trustees - Frank B. Holding, Jr. — Former Chairman of the Board ## Questions ### Who runs investment decisions at the Blue Cross NC Retirement Plan? The investment function is overseen by CFO Mitch Perry, who sits on the Investment Committee, and Nicholas Chiarello, the Director of Investments and Assistant Treasurer. The plan reports to a Board of Trustees chaired by Edward L. Curran, with the parent company's CEO, Tunde Sotunde, serving as a Board Trustee. Former First Citizens Bank CEO Frank B. Holding, Jr. previously chaired the Board, per Altss research. ### Does the plan maintain a dedicated allocation to real assets? Yes — the plan holds a dedicated timberland investment portfolio within the United States. This is a distinctive feature for a corporate defined-benefit plan of its size. Timberland serves as a long-duration inflation hedge with biological growth returns that are structurally uncorrelated to public equity and fixed-income markets. ### Is the Blue Cross NC Retirement Plan a public or corporate pension? It is a corporate defined-benefit pension plan sponsored by Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina, an independent nonprofit health insurer. It is not a public system, meaning it operates without the FOIA-driven transparency and political oversight that apply to state and municipal pension funds. ### Is the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina Foundation related to the pension plan? The foundation is a separate 501(c)(3) grantmaking entity focused on health equity across North Carolina. There is no public evidence of commingled assets, program-related investing, or overlapping mandates between the foundation and the retirement plan. The two share a parent organization but operate with distinct governance and asset pools. ## Related profiles - [Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Montana](https://altss.com/profile/blue-cross-and-blue-shield-of-montana) - [Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Oklahoma](https://altss.com/profile/blue-cross-and-blue-shield-of-oklahoma) --- Source record modified: 2026-08-11T02:43:31.692Z Last verified: not supplied by this public snapshot. ## Sources and provenance - Organization website as recorded: https://www.bluecrossnc.com/ Source links do not imply that every field was verified on the page modification date. See [Altss methodology](https://altss.com/methodology). Canonical page: https://altss.com/profile/blue-cross-and-blue-shield-of-north-carolina-retirement-plan Maintained by Altss — https://altss.com — methodology: https://altss.com/methodology