June 2018

28Jun

Market volatility putting thousands of UK pension pots at risk

Thousands of people in drawdown are not adjusting their pension income levels to account for market volatility, leading to fears they could drain their retirement pots too quickly, research from Zurich has found. The study found that 41% in drawdown are withdrawing the same amount from their pension regardless of how the stock market performs. In a statement released on 27 June, a Zurich spokesperson said: “With more than 431,000 retirees using income drawdown to fund their retirement, this means as...

June 28, 2018
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27Jun

UK government wrong to deny pension to transgender woman, rules European court

The UK government discriminated against a transgender woman by denying her a state pension upon retirement age, the European Court of Justice has ruled. Britain’s Supreme Court had asked European judges to rule on the case, which involved an unnamed individual who was born a man in 1948. The claimant, referred to only as MB, married a woman in 1974 and later had two children. She began to live as a woman in 1991 and underwent gender reassignment surgery in 1995. Read...

June 27, 2018
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27Jun

Kenya. Private Equity funds eye pension billions

Private equity (PE) and venture capital (VC) funds have set their sights on attracting up to Sh50 billion investments from pension schemes in five years, signalling an intensifying scramble for workers’ savings. Investment guidelines under the Retirement Benefits Act 2016 allow pension fund managers and trustees to sink up 10 per cent of assets under their watch in PE and VC funds. That followed four years of agitation by the PE funds for a change of rules to facilitate increased investments...

June 27, 2018
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26Jun

African pension funds look to Dubai to invest capital

In Africa, there has been the emergence of an ecosystem around pension funds. A recent institutional investor study estimated that the 10 largest funds in Africa held a combined $310 billion in assets. This has transpired for a number of reasons, not the least of it being a shift in many of these countries switching from defined benefits to defined contribution schemes. In Botswana, for example, where the shift took place in 2001, there are more than 100 pension funds...

June 26, 2018
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26Jun

US. MetLife Faces Court Challenges for Pension Risk Transfer and Beneficiary Practices

A would-be class representative whose benefit liability was transferred to MetLife in a pension risk transfer (PRT) deal has filed an expansive lawsuit, challenging the company’s practices across its PRT and group annuity contract services business. Filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, the complaint names as defendants MetLife, Inc.; the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company; and Brighthouse Financial, Inc. Summarizing the complaint, the lead plaintiff says he is suing these companies “for conversion and...

June 26, 2018
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26Jun

UN. Time to retire unsustainable pensions

Pensions, by their very nature, have to be sustainable. After all, they’re supposed to provide a measure of long-term certainty in an uncertain world. Much of the world’s working population counts on this basic premise as they seek to build a nest egg for later life. Rather than stash their cash under the mattress, they put their faith in investment funds making what they hope are healthy bets. Naturally, the assumption would be that pension funds are investing in sustainable businesses,...

June 26, 2018
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25Jun

Egypt raises military pensions amid austerity measures

Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi has raised pensions for military personnel and salaries for civil servants by 15% amid a wave of price hikes linked to austerity measures. The raises, published late on Saturday in the official gazette, will take effect on July 1. Sisi, a retired general, has raised military pensions several times in recent years. In recent days the government has raised the price of fuel, drinking water and electricity as part of a reform program tied to a three-year,...

June 25, 2018
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25Jun

UK. EC2 Master fined £15,000 for not collecting or investing nearly £900,000 of pension contributions

The Pensions Regulator (TPR) has fined master trust pension scheme trustee EC2 Master, which holds assets for the Autoenrolment.co.uk master trust, £15,000 for failing to collect and invest £888,651.94 worth of pension contributions from 2,115 members. TPR found in its determination notice, published on Friday 22 June 2018, that EC2 Master did not ensure that the Autoenrolment.co.uk master trust scheme, which is run by Smart Pension, had a proper reporting system in place to comply with statutory requirements. This meant that...

June 25, 2018
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25Jun

Nigeria. PenCom allows pension contributors to pick investment options

Beginning from July, workers under the Contributory Pension Scheme will be allowed to go to their Pension Fund Administrators to choose how they want the money in their Retirement Savings Accounts to be invested so as to gain higher interest based on the new multi-fund structure, NIKE POPOOLA writes Following the enactment of the Pension Reform Act, 2014, the National Pension Commission amended the investment regulation in April 2017, largely to incorporate the new provisions in the law as well...

June 25, 2018
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