Asset Allocation – Page 182
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Features
Ringing tone of success
As the bulk of the Greek pension system was mired in mismanagement and overregulation, the country’s incumbent telecoms operator, OTE, has stood out as a beacon of success with a cumulative return since the OTE pension fund started investing in 2002 of 26.37% with returns of 10% in 2003, last ...
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Maltese resurrection
After many years of an exclusively state operated pension system in Malta the occupational scheme seems to be set for a comeback. Company schemes existed in until 1979 but these were replaced by state provision when the government of the day decided that state provision should be good enough for ...
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Moving into mainstream
Emerging market debt (EMD) is an asset class that that encompasses sovereigns and corporates, high yield and investment grade and dollar as well as local currency instruments. Given this complexity, it is no wonder that market attention has only focused on the headline crises that have left deep-rooted prejudices within ...
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Uncertainties spawn hybrids
The shift from defined benefit (DB) to defined contribution (DC) pension plan designs has been widely reported in the UK and further a field. However, a ‘pure’ DC scheme is not always possible and, even when it is, it is not always the ideal solution. To what extent are we ...
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Trying to get some space
During the campaign for February’s general election the then-opposition Socialist Party (PS) promised to cut taxes, raise public sector wages and increase pensions. The governing right-of-centre Social Democrat Party (PSD) was offering fiscal stringency. For a majority of the electorate the choice seemed obvious, and PS leader José Sócrates emerged ...
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Features
For FTK read PVK
The Dutch authorities’ decision in September to delay the FTK for pension funds by a year, while broadly expected, was still significant. The central bank said that the new Financial Assessment Framework (nFTK) would not be compulsory for pension funds until 1 January 2007. The decision followed consultation with the ...
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Herculean efforts required
Greece’s highly successful Olympic Games - coming hot on the heels of its unexpected triumph in the Euro 2004 football championships - seemed to do much to lift it out of its reputation as a rather lumbering, chaotic nation best known for its Mediterranean climate, cuisine, music and dancing, and ...
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Devising an investable index
There has been a growing emphasis on pension fund liability management and creating a portfolio of assets to match these liabilities. The popular press has published several recommendations to protect pension fund solvency through the immunisation of liabilities. Recommendations have ranged from the approach of the Boots Pension fund, which ...
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Simulating DC outcomes
Defined contribution (DC) pension schemes are complicated financial products. However, they are ideal subjects for stochastic simulation methods1, and research on them has developed to the point where we now have the basis of a commercially feasible DC pension model2. This article begins by explaining the structure of this model. ...
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Cyprus' hints of progress
Of the 334,000 people registered with Cyprus’ first pillar social security system around 142,500 have some form of additional pension provision. Some 30,000 of these are employees of central government who benefit from a pay-as-you-go system. The rest are covered by some form of funded or part-funded scheme. Among them ...
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Success comes to the nimble-footed
Industriens Pension is the largest of a number of pension schemes based on collective bargaining agreements that were established in Denmark in the early 1990s to provide supplementary pensions for the country’s workers. The scheme covers the entire industrial sector and has around 320,000 members in 8,200 companies. The industrial ...
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Lobbying with Chinese chacteristics
The Chinese authorities are pressing ahead with the implementation of a pension reform that is intended to build a sustainable system for all employees, according to Wang Dongjin, vice-minister of labour and social security. The reforms are part of the transformation of communist China’s economy and society that began in ...
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Risk moves centre stage
The UCITS III Directive has set Europe’s cats among the pigeons and has far reaching consequences for all institutional investors as regulators and investment manager trade organisations consider its impact on the broader issues of appropriate, and best, practice. This is none truer than in the field of risk management ...
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Features
Celebrations on hold
Despite a more than 6% return in the first half, Swiss pension funds have no reason to celebrate due to low bond yields, says the Swiss pension fund association ASIP. Zurich-based ASIP and consulting firm Watson Wyatt reported a 6.2% return for the first six months – driven by strong ...
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Capitalising on progress
France’s system of universal retirement provision dates back to the years immediately following the second world war. The role of the compulsory pay-as-you go (répartition) element has long been significant and is in line with the strong Gallic preference for the social model. This preference dates back even further – ...
