All IPE articles in December 2003 (Magazine) – Page 2
-
Features
Harmonised schemes offer fresh opportunities
Flexibility and freedom of choice are the key words in the new pensions and benefits system of French oil and chemicals sector giant TotalfinaElf. Coinciding with the Loi Fabius on pensions and savings, the newly-merged group was quick to act in setting out its vision for new harmonised supplementary schemes ...
-
Features
Flexibility in matching pension liabilities
“Pension funds worldwide are in big trouble.” This bleak sentence starts a working paper on ‘How derivatives can help solve the pension fund crisis’, written by the Cass Business School1. Factors such as increasing life expectancy and changes in accounting rules have made it difficult for many pension fund managers ...
-
Features
Fund of funds gives focus to private equity investment
ATP Private Equity Partners was set up two and a half years ago to manage the global private equity investments on behalf of ATP and SP, the Danish supplementary pension arrangements. ATP Private Equity Partners combines the private equity incentive and co-investment model with the long-term capital source from an ...
-
Features
Seeking out security for employees
A very new fund, the Vodafone Pension Trust is a CTA that was only established in March 2003, sponsored by Vodafone Deutschland. Open to all 10,000 participating employees in Germany, it offers a defined benefit (DB) scheme plus an employee-financed defined contribution (DC) scheme for 1,500 active members, 800 retired ...
-
Features
The right numbers for telecoms employees
With the establishment 12 years ago of its own pension fund management company, Fonditel Pensiones EGFP (Fonditel), telecoms group Telefónica claims to be the pioneer model of the new second pillar pensions industry in Spain. Fonditel’s mandate was to implement its own autonomous investment policy with the objective of ensuring ...
-
Features
Focusing on customer service
The pension fund of ABP, Europe’s largest retirement plan, needs little introduction. A self-administered public pension fund for employers and employees in the government, education and defence sector, at year-end 2002 its customer base consisted of approximately 1.1m active participants, 700,000 inactive participants and 700,000 pensioners. The insured are employed ...
-
Features
Swift-footed giant takes the crown
The 2003 IPE Awards European Gold Winner for best European Pension Fund, ABP, is that rarest of beasts – a giant pension fund that is quick on its feet. As the judges for the IPE Awards commented: “Still and despite being the largest and opinion leading European/Dutch pension fund, it ...
-
Features
Information is a special duty for creator of web
The CERN Pension Fund – the fund of the European Organisation of Nuclear Research – was set up in 1955 to insure members, beneficiaries and family members against the financial consequences of disability and old age of members, and death of members and beneficiaries. CERN is a non-profit research laboratory ...
-
Features
Quality services at an optimum cost
The London Pensions Fund Authority, set up in 1989, is one of the largest administrators in the UK of the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS). It has 73,000 members from this scheme, and includes more than 220 employers. As well as this, the LPFA operates nine agency administration contracts, covering ...
-
Features
Consolidating platforms
Industry utilities have a reputation for procrastination and entropy, but over the past five years Euroclear, the Brussels-based international depository, has displayed an admirable determination to seize the initiative and, even more unusually, to bite the bullet when it comes to making tough choices. The merger between fellow ICSD Cedel ...
-
Features
Confidence index rises
Institutional investors’ confidence rose in October, according to a new State Street index. “The October index shows investor confidence rose 1.7 points to 104.2 from a revised September level of 102.5,” says State Street. It added that the increase continues the trend seen throughout much of 2003. Confidence was at ...
-
Features
Committed to flexibility and customised pensions
Still the largest pension fund in the Netherlands, with over a million active members, 700,000 inactive members and 700,000 pensioners, ABP is the self-administered occupational pension scheme for the Dutch public sector. Aside from pensions, it offers disability and death benefits for survivors and dependants. ABP’s long-standing defined benefit structure ...
