July 2018

03Jul

100 Largest US Pensions Lose $27.8 Billion in Q1

The top 100 US public pension systems have had their worst performance since September 2015, reports new US Census Bureau data. Total earnings for the funds were just $14.3 billion in this year’s first quarter, and total assets lost $27.8 billion. They are now down to $3.78 trillion. Totals have not slipped since September 2015, the Census Bureau reports. Pension contributions from employees and employers also fell in the quarter. Benefit payments saw a small increase. Read More: Chief Investment Office

July 3, 2018
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03Jul

Pensions and Pemex to figure in Lopez Obrador’s Mexico plans

Mexico’s next president, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, supports ideas such as creating a fiscal committee for prudent economic management, reforms of pensions and cost-cutting at state-owned oil firm Pemex, a senior aide told Reuters. The leftist Lopez Obrador won a landslide victory on Sunday, besting a four-candidate field with more than 53 percent of the vote in preliminary results. In the elections for Congress, his MORENA party and its allies could win majorities in both chambers, according to projections based...

July 3, 2018
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02Jul

Smart Approaches To UK Pension Transfer Advice

Last week the UK’s main financial regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority, recommended how firms, advisors and clients should deal with recent freedoms to shift money out of final-salary pensions into defined contribution schemes. With billion of pounds in play, this publication has noted in the past that pensions have become a sexier subject for wealth managers. Some commentators are concerned if people take out money from defined benefit pensions and blow money on consumption and end up without enough...

July 2, 2018
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02Jul

Ireland’s ‘bizarre pensions landscape’ criticised by industry leader

Consultation on the proposed introduction of mandatory pension savings in Ireland misses the point: what is needed is simplification of Irish pension structures. At least that’s the view of Ireland’s pension trustees. The Government is preparing to launch a public consultation on how best to introduce auto-enrolment to ensure Irish workers have an adequate pension in retirement. Less than half of private-sector employees currently have occupational pension cover. Tommy Nielsen, chairman of the Association of Pension Trustees in Ireland, and legal...

July 2, 2018
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02Jul

UK. Women face ‘glaring’ gender pension gap

Young women aged in their late 20s or early 30s faced an 11% smaller pension pot than men by the time they retired, Fidelity International said. It said women faced a penalty because of motherhood and caring commitments. But it also accepted that the industry was partly at fault for failing to engage women. "We have to recognise where we have failed as an industry," Fidelity International's investment director, Maike Currie, told the BBC News website. She said jargon and a...

July 2, 2018
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02Jul

Russians protest pension reform as Putin popularity slides

Several thousand people protested Sunday across Russia against a hugely unpopular government decision to hike the pension age that has led to a record slump in President Vladimir Putin's approval ratings. Rallying in dozens of cities from the far east and Siberia to central and southern Russia, many urged Putin to oust the government, while some called on the Kremlin leader himself to "retire." Both Kremlin-friendly trade unions and political parties and Putin's top critic Alexei Navalny organised the rallies, in...

July 2, 2018
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June 2018

29Jun

UK watchdog urged to cap pension charges to end ‘rip-offs’

Britain’s markets watchdog should cap charges on drawdown of pension savings after “glacial” progress in stopping customers being ripped off, a senior lawmaker said on Thursday. Britons have been able to cash in their pension pots since the country’s pensions market was opened up in 2015. But a review by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published on Thursday found that people are not always getting the best deal and that there is a lack of transparency on charges. “The FCA found...

June 29, 2018
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29Jun

Portugal. Civil service unions reiterate demand for 4% pay rise

“We shall today hand in the Common Demand Proposal for 2019, which was approved at a summit of unions on 22 June," Ana Avoila said at an impromptu news conference in front of the Ministry of Finance building in Lisbon. "It is a proposal that, this year, is being handed in earlier." Among the demands in the document is one for a 4% increase in salaries and pensions. “We are still awaiting the government's counterproposal to our demands," she said, adding...

June 29, 2018
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29Jun

PEPP Expat Pensions Ready To Roll In Europe

The new European Union PEPP pension for expats is ready to go, according to the latest reports. Draft regulations are to go before the European Parliament to allow the roll-out of the new-style pension across Europe. PEPPs – Pan European Pension Products– are designed to give retirement savers more choice while boosting the market for personal pensions, which is generally poor across the continent. Read More: iExpats

June 29, 2018
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29Jun

Spain. Montero wants big companies to contribute to pay the pension rise

"The government will be in tune with new taxation that is being raised from Europe and, fundamentally, by responding to taxation of 21st century, in terms of technology, environment or those issues which, today, taxation does not pick up that Activity or no such services are severed. " In this way, Minister of Finance announced yesterday in Congress its intention to update Spanish tax system. Its intention is to gradually increase fiscal pressure to help finance increase in pensions...

June 29, 2018
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