January 2020

21Jan

UK ‘leading’ European market for ESG investments

The UK is the 'leading European market' for environmental, social and governance (ESG)-related investments, with £6,439bn assets under management, according to joint research by Association of Luxembourg Fund Industry (ALFI) and PwC Luxembourg. The joint report, Beyond their Borders: Evolution of foreign investments by pension funds, stipulated that European managers were taking the lead in applying ESG criteria to investments, with them expecting to observe 9.3 per cent growth from 2017 to 2025. The UK meanwhile is expected to...

January 21, 2020
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21Jan

Romania’s second pillar pension returns at nine-year high

Romania’s second pillar pension funds generated impressive returns in 2019 despite hostile policies from the previous government. According to the Romanian Pension Funds’ Association (APAPR), the seven second pillar pension funds averaged a 12-month nominal, asset-weighted yield as of the end of 2019 of 11.8%, a nine-year high and well above the year’s 4% inflation rate. The previous year the funds returned their lowest ever – and only sub-inflationary yield – of 1% compared to an inflation rate of...

January 21, 2020
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21Jan

Ireland. Restoring pension age to 65 would cost €620m a year, claims FF

Pulling plans to increase the State pension age will cost the incoming government up to €470 million a year, according to Government’s own figures, Fianna Fáil has said. And there will be a further €150 million bill annually if a transition pension is put in place to cover those forced out of their jobs at 65, the party’s spokesman on social protection Willie O’Dea said. The comments come as political parties come under pressure from voters over plans to...

January 21, 2020
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21Jan

Head of Canada Pension Fund Warns on Rush to Iliquid Assets

The biggest global funds should all be monitoring their investments in illiquid assets, according to the head of Canada’s largest pension fund. “I do ring the alarm bell on not to be too invested in illiquid assets,” Mark Machin, chief executive officer of the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, said in a Bloomberg Television interview Monday at the World Economic Forum in Davos. “We are very comfortable with our risk models and what we would do in various lurches...

January 21, 2020
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20Jan

Ghana. Three-tier pension to increase retirement income security for workers – NPRA

The three-tier pension system will enhance pension benefits and increase retirement income security for workers both in the formal and informal sectors of the economy and improve on the nation's economic future. Mr Hayford Attah Krufi, Chief Executive Officer, National Pensions Regulatory Authority (NPRA), said the three-tier pension system, which was introduced in January 2010 as part of national pensions reform process, sought to ensure that every worker received retirement and related benefits. He said the objectives of the...

January 20, 2020
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20Jan

Costa Rica: Increase In The Social Security Contribution Towards Disability, Old Age And Death

By Anna Karina Jiménez, Gloria Leandro the amendment to Transitory XI of the social security contribution towards Disability, Old Age and Death (IVM by its Spanish acronym) Regulation was published, accepting the recommendation of the Dialogue Board of 2017, which proposed accelerating the implementation period of the established steps for the contribution amounts of the IVM, by the Board of Directors of the Social Security Administration (CCSS) in 2005, so that, as of January 2020, instead of applying...

January 20, 2020
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20Jan

Climate change pushes investors to take their temperature

Policymakers are pushing investors to do more to ensure their portfolio choices help to meet the 2015 Paris Agreement to combat climate change by limiting planetary warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius, and preferably to 1.5C. A vanguard of insurers and pension funds, many of whom will be in Davos this week for the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, say part of the answer is a new “temperature score” that gives a snapshot of how their...

January 20, 2020
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20Jan

Biometrics and digital ID in Africa: GenKey in Niger, Securiport in CAR, new reseller partner for Daon in SA

Heading into a new decade there’s a clear theme in Africa’s digital ID sphere: looming deadlines. First up is Tanzania’s already extended biometric SIM card registration deadline of January 20 then its analogue passport deadline of January 31, the same day Ghana’s pensioners have to have their biometrics registered by in order to keep receiving their pensions. There is also plenty of supplier news: GenKey is embarking on a World Bank project in Niger, Securiport is setting up in...

January 20, 2020
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17Jan

French unions vow to stand firm as pension strike softens

Striking workers poured into streets across France Thursday for a sixth day of demonstrations against a pensions overhaul, putting up a show of defiance after Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said the historic transport stoppage "has gone on for too long". The rallies came on the 43rd day of a strike that again snarled train and metro traffic and caused misery for millions of commuters in Paris especially. "It's never too late to make a government back down," Philippe Martinez...

January 17, 2020
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17Jan

Piñera’s proposal fuels debate on low pensions in Chile

The controversy over low pensions in Chile, the most serious problem identified by the protesting social movement, has increased after President Sebastian Piñera announced changes to the country's pension system. The Chilean president announced on Wednesday evening that he would submit this week a bill to Congress seeking to improve all pensions and, especially, those of women, the middle class and dependent elderly. Piñera said this bill represents a 'structural change,' with a system based on State, worker and...

January 17, 2020
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