August 2023

Vanguard support for ESG shareholder proposals down from last proxy year

Vanguard funds supported only 2% of shareholder resolutions on environmental and social issues at its U.S. portfolio companies in its 2023 proxy year, down from 12% in the prior proxy year. The proxy year lasts from July 1 through June 30, according to a brief published by Vanguard's investment stewardship team on Monday. Specifically, Vanguard said that in proxy year 2023 the firm saw 359 environmental and social proposals put forward for a vote at its U.S. portfolio companies, up from...

US. North Carolina Retirement Systems discloses $500 million in commitments

North Carolina Retirement Systems, Raleigh, committed a total of $500 million to private equity and inflation-sensitive asset funds. The $114.6 billion pension fund disclosed the commitments in a report included with the Aug. 23 investment advisory committee meeting materials on the website of Dale R. Folwell, state treasurer and sole trustee of the retirement system. The commitments closed in June and July of this year, according to the report. Within private equity, NCRS committed $150 million each to Hg Titan 2...

US. IRS Postpones Rule That Hit Older, High Paid 401(K) Savers-And Their Employers

The IRS is again pushing off a start date for new legislation by introducing a transition period. Earlier, the IRS declared a one-year delay in the new reporting requirement for Forms 1099-K. The IRS has now announced an administrative transition period for the new catch-up contribution requirements under the SECURE 2.0 Act. The new rule requires older, higher paid 401(k) participants to make their catch-up contributions into after-tax Roth accounts, instead of pre-tax traditional accounts. Congress meant for it to take...

Retirement Security: Income and Wealth Disparities Continue through Old Age

By GAO Income and wealth inequality in the United States have increased over the last several decades. We looked at whether these trends continue for older Americans as they age. We compared income and wealth for all older households from 1989 through 2016 and found households in the top 20% saw disproportionately greater gains than other households. We also looked at income and wealth for a group of older Americans as they aged. We found disparities in income decreased, possibly due to...

Global Pension Risk Transfer Monitor: Record H1 Transaction Volumes in UK and US

-The Legal & General Group’s Global Pension Risk Transfer (PRT) businesses – Legal & General Retirement Institutional (LGRI), the United Kingdom’s longest-serving active PRT provider and Legal & General Retirement America (LGRA), a leading provider of pension risk solutions in the United States – today released the latest edition of the Global PRT Monitor, which analyses industry trends and market outlooks in the UK and US. In the US, the Monitor found that last year’s record momentum for US transactions...

U.S. PRT sales totaled $16.2 billion in Q2, more than doubling Q1 volume

U.S. pension risk transfer sales totaled $16.2 billion in the second quarter, more than doubling the volume from the previous quarter, a LIMRA survey found. The total volume in the second quarter also exceeded the volume during the same period last year by 31%, according to the survey. The increase in buyout volume from $12.3 billion in the second quarter of 2022 was primarily due to a single transaction. On May 1, Dallas-based AT&T Inc. announced the third-largest U.S. buyout transaction in history,...

US. CalPERS CIO Nicole Musicco says pension fund taking cautious approach to China

The California Public Employees' Retirement System is being cautious in its approach to China because of the political blowback it could face for betting on a geopolitical rival of the U.S., according to Chief Investment Officer Nicole Musicco. "We're being mindful about our exposure in China right now," Ms. Musicco said during an episode of "Bloomberg Wealth with David Rubenstein" — and she added that the pension fund giant is taking pains to "avoid having any big losses if we...

US. ‘Staggering’ Number of Adults Don’t Know How Long Retirements Last

They found that less than 40% of adults correctly identified the average lifespan at retirement age. “Longevity literacy is particularly important since retirement income security inherently involves planning, saving, and preparing for a period that is uncertain in length,” Surya Kolluri, head of the TIAA Institute, said in a statement. “Our research clearly demonstrates a lack of longevity literacy among the vast majority of U.S. adults. Improving this can promote better retirement security and mitigate longevity risk.” The researchers said there...

US. Pension Risk Transfer Deals Hit Record Level in First Half of 2023

In the first half of 2023 plan sponsors completed a record 289 pension-risk transfer transactions totaling $22.4 billion in premiums, according to a report from Aon, the largest PRT adviser. Aon predicted that the full year would see $40 billion in PRT deals, noting that the PRT market typically is busiest in a year’s second half. The report declared: “The pipeline continues to be robust, and we are hearing a lot of interest from plan sponsors. We expect a busy second half...

US. Pension funds in their best shape since just before the last two stock-market crashes

How do you lose more than $400 billion and still end up better off than you were before? Easy. You run a pension fund. America's top corporate pension funds have broken into surplus this year for the first time since 2007, just before the global financial crisis, despite disastrous 2022 investment losses on the stock and bond markets. The reason? Even while markets plunged, rocketing inflation has also led to soaring long-term interest rates. And thanks to accounting rules, pension funds can...