OREANDA-NEWS. S&P Global Ratings today said it assigned its 'AAAf' fund credit quality rating on the Florida Education Investment Trust Fund – FEITF Term Portfolio Series June 18 (FEITF Term). The rating is based on our analysis of the credit quality of the portfolio's eligible investments, the counterparties, and overall management.

The Florida Education Investment Trust Fund (FEITF) is a common law trust organized under the authority of the Florida Interlocal Cooperation Act of 1969. The fund is meant to serve as an investment opportunity for State of Florida school districts, political subdivisions of the state, or instrumentalities of political subdivisions of the state. FEITF was established on Oct. 22, 2010.

FEITF Term offers a fixed-rate, fixed-term investment with a minimum maturity of 60 days and a maximum maturity of one year. FEITF Term seeks to produce the highest earnings consistent with maintaining principal at maturity and meeting redemption schedule. The investment strategy of FEITF Term is to match the cash flows required to meet participants' planned withdrawals, including the projected dividend, with the cash flows from the portfolio.

The fund's investment objective is to provide a competitive yield for participants while preserving capital and maintaining liquidity. The fund seeks to achieve its investment objective through professionally managed investment programs in accordance with Florida law and governed by the investment policies and restrictions. The portfolio will generally consist of obligations of the U. S. government or its agencies and instrumentalities, commercial paper, certificate of deposits, time deposits, and repurchase agreements. The weighted average maturity for the fund is restricted to one year, and the credit quality of the issuer's or guarantor's short - and long-term unsecured debt must be rated in one of the two highest categories by a nationally recognized rating agency.

PFM Asset Management LLC is the administrator and investment adviser for the fund. As of June 2016, PFM had approximately $65 billion in assets under management with more than 200 employees. Wells Fargo Bank N. A. serves as the custodian bank for the fund.

The 'AAAf' rating signifies the fund's portfolio holdings should provide extremely strong protection against losses from credit defaults. Our credit quality and volatility ratings are based on our analysis of a fund's eligible portfolio investments and strategy, historical return volatility, and management. The seven-category credit quality rating scale ranges from 'AAAf' (highest level of protection) to 'CCCf' (least protection). The ratings from 'AAAf' to 'CCCf' may be modified by the addition of a plus (+) or minus (-) sign to show relative standing within the major rating categories.

Our analysis seeks to identify risk sources in a managed fund's portfolio and investment strategies and to assess the likelihood of losses from credit defaults in the portfolio. We monitor fixed-income funds monthly to ensure the consistency of the funds' credit quality and volatility profiles with the assigned ratings.