Asia Pacific: Pensions and Investment News and Analysis
Latest news and analysis of pensions, asset management, regulation and trends in the Asia Pacific region from our award-winning journalists.
Australian super funds expand their global footprint
With billions of dollars flowing into its treasury each year, Australia’s largest industry super fund, AustralianSuper, is finding that it is rapidly outgrowing its own backyard.
Asia Investment - Special Report
In this month’s special report on Asia, IPE’s private markets editor Lauren Mills analyses why global institutional investors are setting their sights on Asia. The combination of strong fundamentals and a lack of correlation with the European and North American economies make the region’s private assets particularly attractive. Investors are particularly hungry for infrastructure assets as well as the region’s fast-growing digital infrastructure.
How investors are positioned to capitalise in APAC private markets
Strong fundamentals and a lack of correlation with western markets make the region particularly attractive
Investors take a cautious asset allocation path on Asia
Investing in the region is far from straightforward, with benchmarking particularly tricky
Sumitomo Mitsui Trust's Yoshio Hishida on Japan's unique position to attract investment
Yoshio Hishida, CEO of Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Asset Management, one of Japan’s largest investment managers, talks to Christopher Walker about his company’s focus on retail and attracting international capital
Concerns over plans for Australian super funds to provide advice
In what some see as a controversial move, Australia’s Labor government under prime minister Anthony Albanese has reformed the nation’s financial advice industry, opening the door for industry superannuation funds to offer financial advice to millions of members.
Norway’s SWF criticises Japan’s new M&A guidelines
NBIM says “unclear” rules around corporate valuations could let boards reject takeover bids without challenge
Letter from Australia: Retail funds lured by private markets
Australia’s retail funds are trying to navigate the unfamiliar terrain of private markets as they seek to lift their performance.
Australia: volatility stirs valuations debate
As a disconnect in the valuation of listed and unlisted assets widens in today’s volatile markets, the torchlight is again being trained on Australia’s guardians of retirement savings.
Japan: New hand on the tiller
Kazuo Ueda, is the first new governor of the Bank of Japan (BoJ) in 10 years. One of outgoing governor Haruhiko Kuroda’s last moves was to widen the yield curve control (YCC) band on 10-year bonds from +/-25bps to +/-50bps. The reaction from the bond market over the following few days was to trade to the new upper limit.
Australia: Caps, concessions and class war
The Australian Federal government recently moved to make a “modest” change to the nation’s superannuation system which, it says, will save A$2bn (€1.2bn) a year for its over-stretched budget.
Emerging market equities – Investors watch as China corrects course
The Chinese government has managed to restart the economy post-COVID, but investors are cautious
Emerging market equities – India’s dancing elephant in the room
Despite challenges with corporate governance and corruption, the prospects for India are too bright to ignore for investors
Nikko Asset Management: Complex, creative thinking
Stefanie Drews is at home with complexity. She speaks several languages fluently, including Japanese, and tells us she still does her maths in Italian.
Australia: Super funds shift to fixed income
With fear of recession in Australia and globally, superannuation funds have gone into defensive mode. Cash and liquidity are two key considerations for CIOs, and some are waiting to take advantage of attractive market opportunities.
The West should understand the strengths and limitations of Enterprise China
China is fast becoming the West’s bogeyman. Yet a hard decoupling of the two would be a lose-lose situation for both. Despite the tensions, private companies face the challenge of creating viable strategies for interactions with China that could make the difference between success and bankruptcy.
Research: How pension funds look at Chinese assets
Allocations to Chinese assets are still modest. Vincent Mortier and Amin Rajan discuss key issues in the third and final article from the latest Amundi-Create-Research Survey
Australia: Regulator targets greenwashing
Vanguard, one of the world’s largest investment managers, suffered the indignity in December of being the second company in Australia to receive an infringement notice for alleged greenwashing.
Central banks and the weaponisation of finance
The US has been a global power since the second world war. But it was during the interval between the collapse of the USSR in 1991 and the rise of China in the 21st century that the US was perhaps the single global hegemon.
Australia: Super funds face the future of fossil fuels
After a year when fossil fuel stocks outperformed all other shares, Australian super funds face a conundrum – to buy, hold or sell?
Norges blacklists Indian, Chinese state firms on Myanmar risks, after holding €32.2m
Chinese state-owned AviChina Industry & Technology and Indian government-owned Bharat Electronics now excluded from Norway’s giant SWF
DC Pensions: Australians exercise pension choice
While the default MySuper dominates the superannuation industry, Australia’s defined contribution system offers a complex and wide range of options for retirement
Norway’s SWF worried about Japan’s lack of female corporate leaders
NBIM speaks out on gender diversity on Japanese company boards
NBIM bans stocks for links to Myanmar government, journalist surveillance
Norway’s giant SWF blacklists PTT PCL and Cognyte Software on human, individuals’ rights risks, ends observation of Leonardo
Special Report – Prospects 2023
The past year will be remembered as one of the most challenging for institutional investors ever. The outlook for 2023 is brighter, if anything because valuations of major asset classes have come back to historical levels.
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