March 2023

UK. What are the implications of removing the pensions lifetime allowance?

One of the headline announcements of the budget on 15 March was the scrapping of the lifetime allowance for private pensions. The allowance – which currently stands at just over £1 million – is the maximum that an individual can draw from their pension in their lifetime without paying additional tax. Unsurprisingly, this policy, which will come into force from April 2024, has been criticised by some commentators, as it is higher earners who are likely to benefit most. How does...

Hackers breach U.K. Pension Protection Fund, steal employee data

Hackers obtained data on some employees of the U.K.'s Pension Protection Fund after exploiting a third-party data transfer service, according to a fund spokesperson. The Pension Protection Fund manages £39 billion of assets for its 295,000 members, according to its website. The fund protects people with a defined benefit pension when an employer becomes insolvent. By exploiting the Go Anywhere transfer service, intruders compromised some employee data, Jenny Peters, a spokesperson for the fund, said in a statement. The hackers were...

UK. One third of people facing a drop in retirement standards

One in three savers have moved from an expected ‘moderate’ retirement lifestyle to a ‘minimum’ lifestyle, according to analysis by Wealth Wizards. The financial planning firm analysed data from more than 40,000 users of the Wealth Wizards Pension Guidance Software as a Service (SaaS) platform and found almost one in five pensioners are not on track for the living standards they would like in retirement. Additionally, the analysis of the data gathered over the last two years found one in three...

Britain says it won’t ditch global accounting rule to unlock pensions cash

Britain on Wednesday played down the possibility of diverging from a globally-set accounting rule which some lawmakers blame for encouraging pension schemes to prefer low risk government bonds over stock markets. City minister Andrew Griffith in February said a global accounting rule needed reviewing as it had become a "performance penalty" which trapped cash in pension schemes which otherwise could be invested in companies and the economy. The so-called IAS 19 rule requires company defined benefit pension schemes to "mark to...

UK. Ministers reportedly scrap plan to bring forward rise in UK state pension age

Ministers have reportedly delayed plans to bring forward a rise in the state pension age amid falling life expectancy in the UK. The state pension age, which is currently 66, was due to rise to 68 after 2044 but reports earlier this year suggested ministers had planned to bring the increase forward to between 2037 and 2039. However, the Financial Times has reported ministers have decided to delay making a decision until after the next general election because of fears about...

Pension Tax Limits

By Gov.UK Individual members of registered pension schemes who make annual pension contributions over the standard annual allowance (AA), money purchase annual allowance (MPAA), or tapered annual allowance (tapered AA), and who therefore expect to become subject to an AA charge. Individual members of registered pension schemes who already have or expect to have pension savings exceeding either the standard lifetime allowance (LTA) or their protected LTA, and who therefore expect to become subject to an LTA charge. Scheme administrators of registered pension schemes who will need to...

UK abolishes tax threshold on pension allowance to encourage people to work longer

British finance minister Jeremy Hunt on Wednesday said he would abolish the tax thresholds high earners face when they invest in pensions, in a bid to encourage them to keep working and reduce the number of people taking early retirement. Hunt said in his annual budget that he would scrap the so-called lifetime allowance, which had meant that people faced a 25% levy if they saved around 1.1 million pounds ($1.33 million)in their pension pots. The capped amount of money that...

UK. Budget: Pensions to get boost as tax-free limit to rise

The total amount that workers can accumulate in their pension savings before paying extra tax is expected to be increased in Wednesday's Budget. The final figure has not been confirmed, but people are expected to be able to save up to £1.8m over a lifetime, up from £1.07m currently. The policy aims to stop people - particularly doctors - from reducing hours or retiring early owing to tax. Critics say the move will only benefit a small fraction of the workforce. UK economic...

UK. DB Pension Risk Transfers May Slow Due to Lack of Liquidity

High interest rates have made it a good time for some defined benefit plan sponsors to transfer pension risk, but a liquidity pinch may be delaying or altogether shutting off the window, according to experts who spoke at PLANADVISER’s virtual DB Summit last week. The interest rate hikes, which the Federal Reserve started about a year ago to try and tame inflation, have brought present liability down for many plans, said Gloria Griesinger, assistant treasurer for global pension investments and...

The gender gap in pension saving

By Jonathan Cribb, Heidi Karjalainen & Laurence O’Brien This report is an output from a programme of research on ‘Pension saving over the lifecycle’ (WEL /FR-000000374) that is funded by the Nuffield Foundation. Co-funding from the ESRCfunded Centre for the Microeconomic Analysis of Public Policy (ES/T014334/1) is also gratefully acknowledged. We are grateful to Alex Beer, Carl Emmerson and Paul Johnson for useful comments, and to Rowena Crawford for discussion and advice on this work. This work was produced using data from...