Latest analysis – Page 59
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Features
The good, the bad and the average
New analysis from Merrill Lynch indicates that hedge funds have never been so closely correlated with equities as they have in the past three years. It initiated another of those periodic waves of comment that pension funds are wasting their time and money going to hedge funds for “uncorrelated returns”.
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Features
I polder, you polder
In October, the Dutch pension system was named the best in the world for the third year running by the Melbourne Mercer Global Pension index. But despite its top ranking, the Dutch system scored less on adequacy and sustainability than the previous year and its overall index value slipped from 78.3 to 77.9. In the Netherlands, as elsewhere, pension provision is under threat from a rising tide of troubles, including an ageing (and long-lived) population, low interest rates and fretful financial markets.
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Features
A precarious balance
We have heard much in recent years about institutions that were, or are, ‘too big to fail’, particularly in 2008 when Bear Stearns collapsed, followed later that year by the entry of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac into government conservatorship, the bailout of AIG and the collapse without rescue of Lehman Brothers.
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Features
Heightened scrutiny on derivatives collateral
The use of credit support annexe (CSA) agreements, defining the collateral that can be posted in bilateral over-the-counter derivative (OTC) trades, has increased significantly over recent years as pension funds have made increasing use of derivatives.
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Features
NAPF: Preparing for auto-enrolment
The EU and DC were two of the most hotly debated topics at October’s National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF) conference in Manchester.
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Features
New chairman rings in the changes at AbA
Attendees of this year’s autumn conference of the German pension fund association Arbeitsgemeinschaft betriebliche Altersversorgung (AbA) in Cologne found an organisation preparing for a new pension era in Germany and across Europe.
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Features
Scepticism over cross-border schemes
The desire to implement defined contribution (DC) pension plans is growing among companies around the world, while the necessity, one day, of a pan-European DC scheme is at the front of industry minds. But even though some pension providers have already paved the way, the journey is a long one.
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Opinion Pieces
Long-Term Matters: Executive Pay
Why should investment professionals care about the ‘#Occupy’ protests? The majority of the public – ie, our customers – share some of the protesters’ views, even if they are not on the streets. One potent driver is the huge growth in income inequality over recent decades. With this comes disgust with politicians for being the primary ‘enablers’.
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Features
Leave it to technocrats?
Those who believe that governance by technocrat will solve Italy’s ills should think again. The IASB is currently working on a three-bucket approach for financial asset impairment. The idea is that newly originated or purchased loans – the model must work for both – are allocated by an entity to one of three buckets. And in very general terms, assets will move from one bucket to another in order to reflect deteriorating credit quality and credit losses. This is the board’s third stab at developing an impairment model since 2009.
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Features
Persistency via operational excellence
In the final article in the current series, Jervis Smith and Amin Rajan highlight the role of third-party administrators as innovation partners
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Opinion Pieces
Fiona Stewart, OECD
Fiona Stewart, principal administrator at the OECD, considers why many institutional investors have failed to live up to their long-term investment potential.
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Opinion Pieces
IORP under pressure
The European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority’s (EIOPA) call for advice on the subject of revisions to the EU’s 2003 IORP Directive on work-place-based pensions closes on 2 January 2012. It seeks advice on the extent to which the legislative framework should be similar to that for other financial institutions and products.
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Opinion Pieces
Investing for impact
“When traditional investors look at impact investing they sometimes think they have to sacrifice returns. Fortunately, there are many examples of impact investing that lead to both competitive returns and positive social impact. In fact, it can be a very competitive field of investing activities versus mainstream assets,” says Scott Budde, head of the global social and community investing department at TIAA-CREF. This is why TIAA-CREF, with $440bn (€319bn) assets, has been involved in impact investing since 2006, and socially responsible investing since the 1980s.
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Features
Pension anger
Even if they can’t easily articulate what single thing could be done to make them go home, the Wall Street protestors and their European counterparts have more than a little in common with the Dutch youth political activists who last month joined forces in a ‘pensions rebellion’ against the Netherlands’ ...
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Features
The ethical oligarchs
Kicking off the National Ethical Investment Week in London, pollster YouGov published the results of a survey measuring the British public’s interest in green and ethical financial products.
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Features
The long-termists
As those who watched the 2006 film ‘300’ will remember, ‘the 300’ refers to the band of Spartans who heroically fought against the Persians at the battle of Thermopylae in 480BC. A modern re-incarnation – The 300 Club – has been brought to life by Saker Nusseibeh, CIO of Hermes ...
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Features
UK pension funds judge buyouts as too costly
This summer’s market turbulence took many UK pension funds by surprise, pushing them to look even more closely at their de-risking strategy. But while pension buyout deal prices have remained fairly stable, the cost of such deals has increased significantly due to falls in bond yields.
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Features
Currency affairs
Three-quarters of respondents to this month’s Off The Record survey used currency management, 91.5% of these doing so for currency exposure hedging and 8.5% for returns.
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Features
A tricky rebalancing act
Last month I attended Lazard Asset Management’s annual investment dinner, where the guest speaker was Peter Mandelson. Lord Mandelson spent eight years as UK Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills and European Commissioner for Trade, so I considered my questions carefully.
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Features
French regulator urges investment in SMEs
The French government’s initiative to set up a private equity fund with institutional investor capital to help small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) secure investments comes as a surprise, considering the bad press accorded to private equity in France since 2008.
