For the 100 largest public-employee pension systems in the country, assets (cash and investments) totaled $3,243.3 billion in the fourth quarter of 2015, increasing 0.9 percent from the third quarter level of $3,215.9 billion. This increase in assets is mainly due to positive earnings, as evidenced by a gain of $63.6 billion in the fourth quarter. Compared to the same quarter in 2014, assets for these major public pension systems decreased 3.0 percent from $3,343.6 billion. The major asset categories highlighted in this summary (equities, debt instruments, and cash equivalents) do not reflect all the categories published for the Quarterly Survey of Public Pensions. Please see the complete data sets on the Web site at <www.census.gov/programs-surveys/qspp.html> for further detail.