September 2021

New U.S. Hedge Fund Taps Japan Pension Cash to Bet on Stocks

U.S. investment advisory firm GSB Capital LLC has started a hedge fund focusing on Japanese stocks, using seed money provided by a corporate pension fund in the Asian nation. The GSB Japan Equity Long Short Fund targets mid- and large-cap Japanese shares, buying equity of companies with attractive fundamentals while shorting those with a poor outlook, a statement showed Monday. It aims to raise a maximum of $650 million, the firm said, without naming the seed-capital provider. Pressured by rock-bottom interest...

Korea’s aging population to sap fiscal health: Fitch

The fast-paced aging of South Korea’s population is likely to undermine the fiscal health of Asia’s fourth-largest economy in the long run amid soaring debt, credit ratings agency Fitch Ratings said Monday. The aging population, coupled with a declining fertility rate of fewer than one child per woman, could leave Korea exposed to higher risks as rising government spending could become a less effective means of boosting nationwide productivity. Read also Australia. Most vulnerable excluded from Disability Support Pension Fitch urged Korea...

Millions of older people in the U.S. live on the economic edge—evictions will send them into homelessness

In late August, the Supreme Court ruled that evictions can resume, despite an effort by the Biden administration to temporarily ban them due to the pandemic. The impact of this ruling could have dire consequences for many older adults already on the financial brink. In fact, the number of homeless people who are 55 and older is rising at an alarming rate. I have seen this first hand as the CEO of Central Arizona Shelter Services (CASS), a 470-bed homeless...

Germany. Pensioners can expect significantly higher pensions

Pensioners in Germany can expect a significant increase in their pay next year, according to the pension insurance fund. "I assume that the missed increase will be made up for to a certain extent next year and that pensioners will get a decent plus in 2022," Gundula Roßbach, President of the German Pension Insurance Association, told the newspapers of the Funke Media Group."How much more it will be, we won't know until next spring, because we have to look...

China launches wealth management product pilots for retirement in four cities

China's banking and insurance regulator said on Friday it will launch wealth management product pilots in four cities aimed at retail investors looking to boost their retirement savings. The products will be sold by wealth management units of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, China Construction Bank, China Merchants Bank and China Everbright Bank. The pilot products will last for a year starting from Sept. 15, and each institution involved can raise up 10 billion yuan ($1.6 billion) of products,...

Nigeria is struggling to get informal workers to save

Between a slumping economy and gnawing inflation, Nigerians are finding life tough. Temilola Balogun, who owns a clothing shop in Lagos, the commercial capital, sighs that it is hard to save anything. This is typical: most adults in Africa’s most populous country do not pay into a pension. Few will be able to retire without being supported by their children. Read also Nigerian pension fund asset rises to N12.8 trillion as RSA contributors hits 9.4 million To change this, in 2019...

US. Pension tension: 15 states with the worst public pensions

Public pensions took a beating during the Great Recession of 2008, and a recent report from the Equable Institute showed there to be no net recovery from those losses. The report also noted that total unfunded liabilities for statewide plans had increased from nearly $100 billion in 2001 to $1.35 trillion in 2019, with an estimated 2020 total of $1.62 trillion as a result of negative cash flows and market underperformance. Unsurprisingly, the pandemic had something to do with that:...

Danish pension sector adopts common climate reporting rules

Denmark’s pensions and insurance lobby announced today it has adopted a set of common climate reporting rules for the sector, as part of the ongoing work in the Nordic country to meet its 2030 emissions reduction goal. The new code – based on the comply-or-explain principle – covers CO2 emissions from investment assets, damage prevention, active ownership and the use of paper in everyday life, according to the announcement from Insurance & Pension Denmark (IPD). It has been devised as part...

Jamaica. John Robinson Is New Chairman Of The FSC

The Ministry of Finance and the Public Service has announced that former Deputy Governor of the Bank of Jamaica (BOJ), John Robinson, has been appointed as the new chairman of the Financial Services Commission (FSC). Mr. Robinson is a career economist and banker with experience in the financial sector spanning more than three decades, 36 of which were spent at the BOJ up to his retirement in 2020 as Deputy Governor. During his tenure, Mr. Robinson held critical roles at the...

Private pension plans in Latin America and sustainable finance

The private pension plan (PPP) market in Latin America is the region’s largest institutional client segment, with more than USD 900 billion in assets under management (AUM) at the end of 2020. And with projections forecasting AUM to reach USD 1.4 trillion by 2023, the PPPs are a reference point for smaller investors. Along with sovereign wealth funds (SWF), Latin America’s PPPs control a significant share of assets relative to GDP and thus can be very influential in the...