July 2023
07Jul

World’s Largest Pension Fund Posts Quarterly Gain, Record Assets

Japan’s state pension fund, the world’s largest, posted its strongest quarter in more than two years as gains in global stock and bond markets during the three months through March boosted the value of its assets to a record. The Government Pension Investment Fund added 5.4% during the quarter, raising its total assets to 200.13 trillion yen ($1.39 trillion), the fund said in Tokyo Friday. Foreign equities were the top performers, gaining 8.2% as the US started to overcome a...

July 7, 2023
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05Jul

Japan. Panel Warns against Leaving Burdens on Shoulders of Future Generations

No matter how urgent and important some issues — such as the low birth rate — may be, the cost of responding to them must not be passed down to future generations. The government should not shirk discussions on the appropriate tax burden. The government’s Tax Commission has submitted to Prime Minister Fumio Kishida a report on proposals for medium- and long-term taxation systems. The panel submitted such a report for the first time in four years, since 2019. The tax...

July 5, 2023
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June 2023
22Jun

ESG resolution round-up: US pension giants split on climate proposal at Japanese bank

Big US public pension funds are divided on the merits of a climate proposal filed at Mizuho Financial Group which calls on the Japanese “mega-bank” to issue and disclose a transition plan to align its lending and investments with the Paris Agreement.     Californian giants CalPERS and CalSTRS have pre-disclosed that they will vote against the resolution on Friday, despite supporting a similar request at the bank in 2020. But The Office of the New York City Comptroller, which oversees...

June 22, 2023
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16Jun

Shareholder ire takes shine off stock rally for Toyota chairman

The biggest rally in three years for Toyota has shown how a well-timed campaign to promote the carmaker’s EV strategy can pay off, but a dip in support for Chairman Akio Toyoda at a shareholders meeting serves as a reminder of the perils of drawing investor ire. A 13% rise in Toyota’s stock added ¥4.4 trillion ($31.4 billion) in market value this week, after the company shared details of how it plans to catch up in the global shift to...

June 16, 2023
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March 2023
01Mar

Japan births fall to record low as population crisis deepens

The number of births registered in Japan plummeted to another record low last year – the latest worrying statistic in a decades-long decline that the country’s authorities have failed to reverse despite their extensive efforts. The country saw 799,728 births in 2022, the lowest number on record and the first ever dip below 800,000, according to statistics released by the Ministry of Health on Tuesday. That number has nearly halved in the past 40 years; by contrast, Japan recorded more...

March 1, 2023
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February 2023
03Feb

World’s Top Pension Fund GPIF Posts Longest Loss in 20 Years

Japan’s state pension fund, the world’s largest, posted a fourth straight quarterly loss in its longest losing streak in two decades. The Government Pension Investment Fund lost 1% during the quarter ended December, or 1.85 trillion yen ($14 billion), reducing its total assets to 189.9 trillion yen, the fund said in Tokyo Friday. Its Japanese stocks holdings rose 3.2% during the period and domestic debt lost 1.7%. The foreign equities portfolio was down 0.05%, while overseas bonds fell 5.3%. Once a...

February 3, 2023
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January 2023
23Jan

Japan. Pension Benefits to Rise for 1st Time in 3 years

Public pension benefits will rise for the first time in three years in fiscal 2023, although at a slower pace than a major inflation rate, the Health, Labor and Welfare ministry said Friday. Benefit increases, set at 1.9% for pensioners aged 68 or over, will be limited because the ministry will activate what it calls the macroeconomic slide mechanism to curb benefit payments for the first time in three years. Japan revises the amounts of pension benefits every year to take...

January 23, 2023
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13Jan

2021 ESG Report. Government Pension Investment Fund

 By: Government Pension Investment Fund Government Pension Investment Fund (GPIF) manages and invests Japan’s pension reserve fund, which is used to pay Employee Pension Insurance and National Pensions. We contribute to the stability of the pension system by earning returns on our investments and distributing these to the government ESG is the acronym for Environmental, Social, and Governance. While investors have traditionally used cash flows, profit margins and other quantitative financial data to value a company’s equity or other securities, “ESG...

January 13, 2023
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09Jan

Bracing for the silver tsunami

Since 2011, sales of adult diapers in Japan have outpaced those for infants, reflecting a decline in the country’s fertility rate (live births per woman) from 3.66 in 1950 to around 1.5 by the early 1990s. Since then, Japanese fertility has remained stuck far below the “replacement rate” (2.1), amounting to a mere 1.3 in 2021. And geriatric Japan is not alone. Fertility rates have also dropped below the replacement level in all eurozone countries, and they are strikingly low...

January 9, 2023
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November 2022
21Nov

Japan seen setting 2023 pension rise below inflation

Japan is expected to curb pension payment rises at rates below that of inflation, according to Nippon Life Insurance's research arm. NLI Research Institute has forecast an inflation rate of 2.5% for full-year 2022, but it expects the government to set the increase in pension payments for those aged 68 and above at only 1.8% for next year. It expects those aged 67 and younger to get a pension rise of 2.1% in 2023. Although there are worries that the financial...

November 21, 2022
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