All articles by Jan Wagner – Page 19
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News
Pension funds buy Austria’s RZB hybrid bond
AUSTRIA – International pension funds were among the buyers in a €500m hybrid bond sale by RZB, an Austrian co-operative bank that has aggressively expanded its business in central- and eastern Europe (CEE).
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News
Flat equity allocation at German blue-chips
GERMANY – Despite last year’s bull run on equities, pension funds for companies on the Dax index kept allocations to the asset class at around 40% in 2005 – virtually unchanged from 2004 – according to a new study by consultant Rauser Towers Perrin.
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News
Germany’s BVK awards €300m to SSGA
GERMANY – Bayerische Versorgungskammer (BVK), Germany’s largest pension fund with €38bn in assets, has awarded State Street Global Advisors a €300m mandate for enhanced equities.
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News
Julius Baer asset management chief von Ah quits
SWITZERLAND – Swiss private bank Julius Baer has announced that Roman von Ah, head of asset management for continental Europe, is stepping down as of April 28.
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News
Austria: asset management degree offered
AUSTRIA – An advanced technical college in Vienna is offering a new master of science degree for quantitative asset management from this autumn.
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News
Invesco boosts German institutional sales
GERMANY – Invesco’s German arm has recruited Bruno Schmidt-Voss from a Frankfurt-based business consultancy as its new senior sales manager for institutional clients.
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German unions want mandatory corporate pension
GERMANY – The German Union Federation (DGB) has urged the government to make it compulsory for employers to offer corporate pensions to their employees.
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News
Swiss funds for small firms gaining members
SWITZERLAND – Pensionskasse Pro and Stiftung Abendrot, two pension funds for small- to midsize enterprises (SMEs), have reported huge gains in the number of insured for 2005.
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News
Heissmann taps Hewitt’s Royers for Paris office
FRANCE – International consultant Buck Heissmann has recruited Joel Royers from rival Hewitt to head its new office in Paris.
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News
Deutsche Bahn boosts pension incentive
GERMANY – German railway and logistics giant Deutsche Bahn says it will double a profit-sharing payout for 125,000 employees in Germany if they use the sum for retirement provision.
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News
Germany’s BVV eyes real estate, private equity
GERMANY – BVV, a €17.7bn pension fund serving Germany’s financial services industry, plans to raise its exposure to real estate to at most 8% over the long-term and is mulling an initial investment in private equity.
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News
German MPs call for civil service pension fund
GERMANY – The budget committee of Germany’s parliament (Bundestag) has urged the government to create a pension fund for federal civil servants instead of, as now, financing their pensions via tax reserves.
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News
Switzerland’s APK outlines switch to DC
SWITZERLAND – Aargauische Pensionskasse (APK), a CHF4.9bn (€3.1bn) pension fund for Swiss civil servants, plans to fully fund its liabilities by January 1 2008 following several reforms – notably a switch to defined contribution from defined benefit.
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News
Munich Re’s MEAG rolls out new funds
GERMANY – MEAG, the asset management arm of German re-insurance giant Munich Re, has confirmed the rollout of four new “i-shares” - mutual funds targeted exclusively at institutional investors.
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News
Swiss institutions cagey on equities - Lusenti
SWITZERLAND – Swiss institutional investors are not likely to increase their exposure to equities in 2006, though they should reduce their holdings in fixed income, according to a new study by Swiss consultant Lusenti Partners.
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News
Austrian funds get court backing on compensation
AUSTRIA – The Constitutional Court has upheld the right of an Austrian pension fund (Pensionskasse) to not compensate its members if, in a given year, the fund cannot pay the guaranteed rate of interest on the member’s accumulated savings.
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News
Equities boost Swiss civil service fund BPK
SWITZERLAND – Bernische Pensionskasse (BPK), a pension fund for civil servants in the Swiss capital of Berne, says last year’s positive equity markets enabled it to finish 2005 with a significantly better return and overfunding.
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News
Bosch outsources pension administration
GERMANY – Industrial group Robert Bosch has outsourced the administration of its German pension schemes, including its Anglo-Saxon style Pensionsfonds, to German consultant Heissmann in one of the biggest mandates of this kind ever.
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Features
Mandatory savings ruled out
Heinrich Tiemann, German deputy minister for labour and social affairs, has reaffirmed that the government has no plans to make retirement saving mandatory. Speaking at a conference, he said that the Riester pension reforms of 2001 had prompted a dramatic rise in demand for second- and third pillar pensions. He ...
