August 2019

27Aug

Japan estimates cast doubt over public pension sustainability

Japan’s government unveiled estimates on Tuesday that showed public pension benefits steadily declining during coming decades, as it prepares to open up a debate on social security reforms needed to support an aging population. Curbing bulging welfare spending is a vital step toward fixing the industrial world’s heaviest debt burden, which is currently more than twice the size of Japan’s $5 trillion economy. While Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government has made welfare reform a top priority, it has moved...

August 27, 2019
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26Aug

Japan. Healthcare for the ageing and elderly worldwide is turning to robots

In America and other ageing societies around the world, it has become common for the elderly to be cared for by their greying children or older workers. That’s largely because the younger labour force is shrinking, and few want to do such low-paying, back-aching work. Japan sees an answer in robots. At Minami Tsukuba nursing home near Tokyo, caregiver Asami Konishi wears a robotic device on her hips that cuts the stress on her back when she bends and...

August 26, 2019
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23Aug

The Effects of Increasing the Eligibility Age for Public Pension on Individual Labor Supply: Evidence from Japan

By Nobuhiko Nakazawa This paper investigates the effects of increasing the eligibility age for public pension on workers' retirement decisions, focusing on recent Japanese public pension reforms. In Japan, the pensionable age for Employees' Pension Insurance benefits gradually increased from 60 to 65 for males over the course of a decade. Using individual-level administrative data and a regression discontinuity design, I find that raising the pensionable age for flat-rate benefits by one year increases male employment at the critical...

August 23, 2019
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21Aug

Japan’s Pension Fund Warns of Global Investing Losses

Global markets have become so synchronized that money managers risk losing on every front, according to Hiromichi Mizuno, chief investment officer of the world’s largest pension fund. Japan’s $1.5 trillion Government Pension Investment Fund lost money in equities, fixed-income and currency positions in the last three months of 2018, Mizuno pointed out on Tuesday in Sacramento, California. Read also World’s Biggest Pension Fund Adds $2.4 Billion “Conventional wisdom of portfolio diversification is when we lose money in equity we make...

August 21, 2019
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19Aug

Japan. World’s largest pension fund promotes ESG and performance-based fees

The largest pension fund in the world has been clarifying its sustainability goals in the last few years and fund managers ought to take note, as it is an initiator and it is working with other large asset owners. Read also Japan’s Pension Fund Warns of Global Investing Losses On Tuesday, CalPERS's investment committee will hear a keynote presentation from Hiro Mizuno, executive managing director and chief investment officer of the Japanese Government Pension Investment Fund (GPIF). He will present...

August 19, 2019
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16Aug

Delaying Retirement: Progress and Challenges of Active Ageing in Europe, the United States and Japan

Dirk Hofacker, Moritz Hess, Stefanie Konig To a backdrop of ageing societies, pension crises and labour market reforms, this book investigates how the policy shift from early retirement to active ageing has affected individual retirement behaviour. Focusing on eleven European countries, the United States and Japan, it brings together leading international experts to analyze recent changes in pension systems. Their findings demonstrate that there has been a fundamental transition in pension policies and a steep increase in...

August 16, 2019
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07Aug

Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund to Support ADB’s Green Projects

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) and Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund (GPIF) recently formed a partnership to support green project financing through investments in ADB’s green bonds. “We are pleased to collaborate with GPIF on this important initiative that promotes environment-related investments in Asia and the Pacific and is closely aligned with ADB’s development mandate,” ADB President Mr. Takehiko Nakao said. ADB issues green bonds to finance projects in the Asia and Pacific region that help its developing member...

August 7, 2019
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02Aug

World’s Biggest Pension Fund Adds $2.4 Billion

The world’s biggest pension fund posted its second straight quarterly gain as overseas stocks and bonds generated returns even as most major currencies depreciated against the yen. Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund returned 0.2%, or 257 billion yen ($2.4 billion), in the three months ended June 30, with assets totaling 159.2 trillion yen, it said Friday in Tokyo. Overseas stocks were the fund’s best performing investment, returning 1.3%, followed by overseas debt and domestic bonds. Its Japanese stocks lost...

August 2, 2019
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July 2019

30Jul

The world’s largest pension may be hedging euro and USD risk

Japan's $1.5 trillion public pension fund has begun to put on hedges to protect against USD and EUR declines, according to a Nikkei report published yesterday.The GPIF "has begun a transaction to avoid (hedge) losses associated with fluctuations in foreign exchange rates through fund management with foreign bonds. The target is US dollar and euro denominated bonds, and the balance at the end of March is approximately 1,300 billion yen," the report says. A hedge of that size will be swallowed...

July 30, 2019
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22Jul

Japan faces long-term challenges despite ruling parties’ election success

The third House of Councillors election since the launch of the second administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has ended. And while Abe's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has fewer seats in the upper house than it did before the election, the ruling LDP and its junior coalition partner Komeito managed to maintain the majority in the chamber. One could say that voters indicated a certain measure of support for the long-term administration, which has been in power for 6...

July 22, 2019
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