August 2022

Tough Times Ahead Warns CEO of Australia’s Largest Pension Fund

Consumers and businesses will continue to struggle as global policy makers battle to get inflation under control, the head of Australia’s largest pension fund told a media forum. “Our view is that there are some pretty tough times ahead,” Paul Schroder, chief executive officer of the A$260 billion ($182 billion) AustralianSuper Pty, said on Tuesday. “We think we are in a continually tight environment. The question now is what is the rate of that tightening and is there a pivot around...

Japan’s GPIF eyes more alternatives after promising returns

After joining alternatives investment rush relatively late, Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund (GPIF) is now speeding up its allocation to the asset class after solid initial performances. As of end June 2022, alternative investments made up 1.32% of the ¥193 trillion ($1.5 trillion) portfolio, amounting to ¥2.548 trillion. The alternatives portfolio was up from ¥1.456 trillion a year before, an increase of about 75% in one year. While growth might not continue to be as rapid, GPIF is advertising for new...

Ghana. SSNIT to embark on mass registration exercise

The Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) says it will soon embark on a mass registration exercise, especially among those in the informal sector to shore up its membership. The prime objective is to ensure many Ghanaian workers are enrolled onto the scheme as against the current situation where only 1.7 million out of the remaining millions of the workers are active members of SSNIT. Read more Nigeria. Pension fund, contributors hit N14trn, 9m respectively – PenCom Dr. John Ofori-Tenkorang, the...

Canada. CPPIB returns -4.2% in quarter on equity market losses

Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Toronto, returned a net -4.2% for the quarter ended June 30, the first quarter of its 2023 fiscal year, said a news release Thursday. CPPIB, which manages the assets of the Canada Pension Plan, said the pension fund's net assets totaled C$523 billion ($406.1 billion) as of June 30, down 3% from C$539 billion three months earlier. The C$16 billion quarterly decrease in net assets consisted of a net investment loss of C$23 billion and C$7...

Canada Pension Plan discloses billions in investments

Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Toronto, reported a large number of investments and commitments it made in the first and second quarters of fiscal 2023, according to news release Thursday issued along with its results for its first fiscal quarter that ended June 30. CPP Investments, which manages the assets of the C$523 billion ($406.1 billion) Canada Pension Plan, said in the fiscal first quarter it closed a C$230 million investment in the term loans of Legal Search, a provider...

US. Tough markets hit active asset managers striving for turnarounds

Some active managers have none of the luck. They shook up senior teams, swapped out their bosses and merged to build scale. But their efforts to overcome the yearslong erosion of assets and profit as investors shift from actively managed funds into cheaper, index-tracking products just took another blow. The latest round of earnings reports offer a bruising read. Rising inflation, Vladimir Putin's war in Ukraine and fears of a looming recession have dented investment performance, prompting investors to yank yet...

These 7 African countries have recorded highest pension fund asset growth

A recent report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has shown that global pension fund assets grew by over 10% to $38.5 trillion in 2021. The report focused specifically on pension fund assets in 68 countries or reporting jurisdictions, consisting of 38 OECD countries and 30 non-OECD countries in Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa. The report said in parts: "Overall, pension fund assets amounted to USD 38.5 trillion in a total of 68 reporting jurisdictions at end-2021. Most...

Dutch pension fund APG completes $600 million MaxCap agreement

Dutch pension fund APG has completed the $600 million mandate with non-bank lender MaxCap Group it agreed to three years ago and given itself the option to double that exposure to $1.2 billion, tapping the growing demand for funding at a time when banks are holding back. The asset manager has exercised the option it took out in 2019 to invest a second tranche of $300 million for first-mortgage loans across all real estate asset classes with MaxCap, which last year sold a...

Nigerian Pension Fund Administrators pay N49.5 billion taxes in 3 years

Pension Fund Administrators (PFA) in Nigeria incurred a sum of N18.85 billion as income tax in 2021, a 15.6% increase compared to N16.31 billion spent in the previous year, and 31.4% increase when compared to N14.35 billion incurred in 2019. This brings the total tax expenses in the past three years to N49.5 billion, according to a report by the National Pensions Commission (PenCom). The report seen by Nairalytics- the research arm of Nairametrics, shows that Stanbic IBTC, ARM Pension,...

Pensions, Crypto, And Trust: Digital Assets And Retirement Funds

Retirement planning is the primary objective of retail investors. Indeed, 47% of respondents in the 2022 CFA Institute Investor Trust Study indicated saving for retirement was their most important investment goal. Yet the conventional pathway to retirement savings - the traditional stock and bond portfolio - is not as effective as it used to be. Weaker diversification, declining real returns, and rising inflation all present major challenges to both defined benefit and defined contribution (DC) pension funds. As funds struggle...