Asset Allocation – Page 167
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Features
Swiss in 2% rate plea
Pension fund association ASIP has urged the government to lower the guaranteed return on pension contributions, insisting that the move is critical to improving the financial health of its members. Earlier this year, the Swiss government decided to leave the rate in question at 2.5%. “An adjustment to the ...
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Special Report
Seeing the wood
The principle of keeping things simple may well turn out to be critical in gaining widespread acceptance of environmental reporting requirements. Simon Thomas is chief executive at Trucost, a research consultancy which specialises in measuring the impact companies have on the environment. He refers to a recent report compiled by ...
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Features
Starting a system from scratch
The office of Mikhel Oim, executive chairman of Hansa Fund Management, is in Tallinn’s burgeoning modern business sector, which spreads out below the picturesque old walled town. Its location mirrors the country’s pensions sector, which has seen new second and third pillar schemes grafted onto a crumbling Soviet-era PAYG first ...
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Features
Ready for take off
Toine van der Stee, who took over as managing director of Blue Sky Group recently, is a relative new comer to the pension sector and appears very upbeat about current developments. “I always make a comparison between the pension sector and other financial sectors in the Netherlands,” he says “Some ...
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Features
Moving into uncharted waters
As the yields on long-term lending shrink, it becomes harder for active managers to justify their fees managing these kinds of investments. Indeed, there is a case for saying that the credit markets in total are not attractive right now for institutions, with even BBB bonds offering just 50-70 basis ...
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Features
Tailoring messages to members
Like many aspects of modern life, pensions are becoming less standardised and more complex, with individuals facing more choice and demanding more information tailored to their needs. As pension funds try to meet the requirements of their members, communication is becoming an increasingly important part of the service they provide. ...
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Features
Maximising your potential
The balance between work and family is of crucial importance for the key challenge Europe is facing: how to enhance innovation by creating a competitive internal market with an adaptable work force while at the same time maintaining social cohesion. The reason is that human capital is the key to ...
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Features
Norway starts mandatory pensions
The Norwegian government has put into motion the process of setting up a mandatory occupational pensions regime that could affect up to 600,000 people. The proposed new law will come into affect from next year and follows a white paper and consultation period. The parliament, the Storting, decided in May ...
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Features
Makeover for the tried and true
It has been a bumper year for German investors so far. Global equities up about 16%, European equities a percentage point higher and even doughty European fixed income has returned 5%. But in spite of the markets’ generosity, providers are still banging the drum for innovation. They fear that unless ...
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Features
Sweden's red light zone
The Swedish financial regulator Finansinspektionen (FI) has launched a consultation on a proposal to identify possible problems at occupational pension funds and life companies using the so-called traffic-light model. Sweden plans to just use red as a signal. “Using the traffic-light model, FI will be able to identify at an ...
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Features
PGGM sees long life in Levensloop
PGGM’s new pension fund subsidiary Careon Levensloop has finalised a seven-year outsourcing contract with KAS Bank and Ordina. The agreement - effective from 1 January 2006 - will see Ordina in charge of administrative tasks, while KAS facilitates the associated banking process. “We will offer products to our clients to ...
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Features
Pensions in a state of insecurity
Norbert Blüm, a former Conservative labour minister, once committed one of Germany’s best-known political gaffes by claiming that the state pension was “secure”. While Blüm had good intentions – meaning to say that payment of some pension was guaranteed – he probably should have realised that his remark would be ...
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Features
Inflation on the prowel
The financial setbacks of recent years have left many pension funds in a difficult position. With their concentration in equities, portfolios were damaged by the collapse of the technology bubble, while the simultaneous fall in bond yields raised pension liabilities. Additionally, government reviews and legislative changes have all placed pension ...
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Features
How secure is your lending?
IPE asked three pension funds in three countries – Ireland, Denmark and the Netherlands – the same question: ‘Does securities lending represent free revenue for pension funds or does it carry underestimated risks?’ Here are their answers: Michael Nellemann Perdersen, CIO at PKA, which groups eight pension funds in ...
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Features
Where the grass is greener?
There seem to be two Irelands when it comes to pensions. The first is the dynamic financial centre that is looking to become a pensions hub for Europe once the occupational pension fund directive kicks in. The second by contrast is a country that is wrestling with its very own ...
