June 2017

13Jun

UAE Pension landscape shows promise

The UAE and wider GCC’s pension landscape is, ultimately, a nascent one. Its youthfulness gives it room for improvement, but it shows a great deal of promise. In a period of low oil prices and slower fiscal growth in the region, the subject of pension reform should be brought to the forefront of the economic agenda. From an asset management perspective, pension reform will have an important impact on the regional investment landscape, bringing with it developments that will...

June 13, 2017
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13Jun

India. PE/VC investments hit 10-year high at $3.1 bn in May

Private equity and venture capital (PE/VC) investments have recorded the highest monthly investments in the past 10 years at $3.1 billion in May 2017. For the third consecutive month in a year, the investment flow crossed the $2-billion mark. The financial services sector topped the table on account of the $1.4-billion investment by Softbank in Paytm. This deal accounted 46 per cent of aggregate deal value for the month. According to Ernst & Young (EY) data, the month recorded a 264...

June 13, 2017
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12Jun

Regulator questions UK pension providers on use of offshore reinsurance.

The UK’s Prudential Regulation Authority, a division of the Bank of England, is reported to have begun questioning UK pension insurers and providers over their use of offshore reinsurance to transfer pension risks. Bank of England logoWith pension de-risking a top priority for insurers, as pension providers grapple with lower returns and longevity risk, among other issues, offloading some or all of a pension scheme to reinsurers has become increasingly attractive. The UK’s Times newspaper reported at the weekend that Sam...

June 12, 2017
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12Jun

SSI Asset Management eyes pension fund ops in Vietnam

The capital market in Vietnam has seen a snowballing expansion throughout the last few years. In the years 2011-2015 as Vietnam kicked off its plan to catapult the capital market, the stock market jumped nearly three times in terms of capitalisation and attracted 50 per cent more investors. In 2016, the market capitalisation rose 26.6 per cent year-on-year to reach $72 billion. Vietnam is now also building a pipeline to grow more instruments such as pension funds and derivatives by 2020....

June 12, 2017
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12Jun

Pension Fund’s Portfolio Decisions: The Dutch Data

DeNederlandscheBank (DNB) issued a working paper this spring about the impact of liquidity and capital constraints on defined benefit pension plans. The paper has three authors, Dirk Broeders, Kristy Jansen, and Bas Werker. The first named author, Broeders, is the only one formally affiliated with DNB. The others are affiliated with Maastricht and Tilburg Universities, respectively. Their paper contains the usual caution that these are the views of the authors, not those of the DNB itself. The relevant definitions are as...

June 12, 2017
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09Jun

US. NYC’s Pension Fund Becomes First In Country To Divest From Private Prisons

New York City's pension fund is the first in the nation to fully divest from private prisons, according to Comptroller Scott Stringer. Trustees of the city's pension fund voted unanimously to divest in mid-May, and have since pulled $48 million of stocks and bonds from three companies: GEO Group, CoreCivic, and G4S. "With Donald Trump in the White House, we're seeing more and more industries try to profit from backwards policies at the expense of immigrants and communities of color,"...

June 9, 2017
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09Jun

EU. Commission struggles with tax exemptions in EU-wide pension proposal

As part of the capital markets union mid-term review, the Commission announced it would submit a legislative proposal on a pan-European personal pension product by the end of this month. Dombrovskis told a group of journalists that the intention is to create a framework to enable providers to offer their pension schemes to customers across Europe. The goal is to correct the “unevenness” of the European market in this field, address the difficulties to switch between products and to facilitate the...

June 9, 2017
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09Jun

How Gold Can Rescue Pensions

The World Economic Forum, in conjunction with Mercers (the actuaries) recently estimated that the combined pension deficit currently stands at $66.9tr for eight countries, rising to $427.8tr in 2050. The eight countries are Australia, Canada, China, India, Japan, Netherlands, UK and US. Of the 2016 figure, $50.5tr is unfunded government and public employee pension promises. Yes, we are now talking in hundreds of trillions. Other welfare-providing states missing from the list have deficits that are additional to these estimates. $66.9tr is...

June 9, 2017
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08Jun

African Financial Institutions against Money Laundering: Challenge accepted

Africa has earned an unfair reputation of being a haven for money laundering and terror financing activity. There’s good reason for this. Africa has traditionally lagged behind developed markets in terms of promulgating legislation to combat money laundering. And where there is legislation, enforcement is lacking – and criminals have taken advantage. While South Africa is somewhat more mature than the rest of the continent, compliance with anti-money laundering (AML) legislation by banks in Africa is seen as a grudge...

June 8, 2017
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08Jun

India. Survey looks for what ageing India needs

Since April 1, teams in Gujarat have gone about meeting 4,000 people aged over 45 to assess their needs, the first step of a nationwide, 25-year exercise aimed at framing long-term policy initiatives for India’s ageing population. The Longitudinal Ageing Study in India (LASI), launched last year by the health ministry, has targeted a sample of 60,000 people over 45, whose health will be documented over 25 years. Gujarat began its fieldwork on April 1 this year, along with Daman...

June 8, 2017
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