November 2020

12Nov

UK regulator urges united front on pension scams

The initiative - launched on 10 November with support from the Pension Scams Industry Group (PSIG) - encourages providers, advisers and pension scheme trustees to support a pledge to take all possible action to reduce and protect members from scams, and includes clear guidance around appropriate due diligence and best practice. The watchdog is calling on the industry to publicly pledge their support for the initiative. According to Action Fraud, more than £30m has been lost to pension...

November 12, 2020
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12Nov

US. California’s state pension fund pushes companies to cut their carbon pollution

Almost 2 million Californians receive a pension from CalPERS, the California Public Employees Retirement System. “Because we’re a pension fund, we rely on companies thriving in the economy to generate the returns, and we pay pensions out of that,” says Anne Simpson of CalPERS. She says climate change may put those investments at risk because extreme weather can hurt company profits. And if governments require cuts to carbon pollution, companies reliant on fossil fuels may lose money. “We need...

November 12, 2020
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12Nov

Kuwait’s $124bn pension fund plans infrastructure boost

Kuwait’s $124bn pension fund, which posted a record first-half profit, plans to double its infrastructure investment and boost exposure to private equity, its director general said. The new plan, developed with US-based consultancy Mercer, will start next year and will “entail increasing infrastructure from 5 per cent to 10 per cent as well as fine tuning some of the other allocations,” Meshal Al-Othman, who heads the Public Institution for Social Security, said in an interview with Bloomberg TV on...

November 12, 2020
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12Nov

German pension system requires tweaks to stand future challenges

The German retirement system will have to continue to adapt to new circumstances through a series of changes to sharpen its private and occupational pensionsprovision, according to panellists speaking at the virtual Handelsblatt annual conference on occupational pensions this week. Measures should be adopted to make savings products “more profitable than today”, if the aim is to rely on private pension provisions, said Dorothea Mohn, head of the financial market team at the organization for the protection of consumers...

November 12, 2020
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12Nov

Pension funds and corporates could save the world

Big institutional investors such as pension and sovereign wealth funds, as well as corporate clean energy buyers must come on board to drive the investment levels needed to stave off catastrophic global heating, according to a report by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA). The Global Landscape of Renewable Energy Finance 2020 study published yesterday states institutional investors sitting on an estimated $87 trillion of global assets supplied only 2% of investment for renewables in 2017 and 2018. Although...

November 12, 2020
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11Nov

Funded Status of US Corporate Pensions Rises $21 Billion in October

The funded ratio of the 100 largest US corporate pension plans rose to 85.1% from 84.4% in October thanks to a third straight monthly increase in the discount rate, which helped boost the funded status of the plans by $21 billion, according to actuarial and consulting firm Milliman. The aggregate deficit of the plans, as tracked by the Milliman 100 Pension Funding Index (PFI), fell to $285 billion, which is its lowest level since March when it was $243...

November 11, 2020
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11Nov

U.K. deficits worsen in October as COVID-19 resurgence bites

The total deficit of U.K. defined benefit funds covered by the Pension Protection Fund's 7800 index increased 1.3% in October, to £168.2 billion ($217.7 billion). The deficit was £166.1 billion at the end of September. Deficits also worsened for the year ended Oct. 31, from £74.3 billion, said an update Tuesday by the London-based PPF. The PPF is the lifeboat fund for the defined benefit plans of insolvent U.K. companies. The funding ratio of the corporate pension plans worsened...

November 11, 2020
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11Nov

Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund Returns 3.05% in Q2

Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund (GPIF) posted an investment return of 3.05% gross of fees during the second quarter of fiscal year 2020 to raise the asset value of the world’s largest pension fund to 167.536 trillion yen, or $1.62 trillion. The fund is now $440 billion larger than the world’s second largest pension fund, Norway’s Government Pension Fund Global (GPFG), which currently has an asset value of roughly $1.18 trillion. To put that in perspective, the gap between...

November 11, 2020
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11Nov

South Africa. The scary facts about the gender pension gap

Echoing concerns raised by the World Economic Forum earlier this year, 10X Investments’ new South African Retirement Reality Report adds more data showing this worrying trend of women falling further behind men. 10X’s third annual Retirement Reality Report (RRR20) shows that the retirement savings gap between the genders has grown in the last year, not only because the gender pay gap has widened, but because many women continue to reject the best option they have for narrowing the gap,...

November 11, 2020
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10Nov

UK. Pension professionals call for TPR to focus on covenant sustainability amid Covid-19

The majority (67 per cent) of pension professions believe that The Pensions Regulator (TPR) should adjust its 'tougher' approach to focus on the sustainable growth of scheme sponsors amid the economic impact of Covid-19, according to a survey from Herbert Smith Freehills. The poll, undertaken during a recent webinar, revealed that just 21 per cent thought that the regulator’s existing 'clearer, quicker, tougher' approach, initially adopted in light of recent high-profile corporate failures, should be maintained in the current...

November 10, 2020
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