Latest from IPE Magazine – Page 363
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Features
Tactics before strategy?
Finally on 26 July, the International Accounting Standards Board launched its public consultation on the shape of its future agenda. “In particular,” it would seem, “IASB is seeking feedback on how it should balance the development of financial reporting with the maintenance of IFRSs and – with consideration of our time and resource constraints – those areas of financial reporting that should be given the highest priority for further improvement,” It is perhaps the most succinct statement you will find anywhere in the consultation paperwork.
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Features
Search for advantage in a crowded market
Why launch an emerging market debt (EMD) strategy when there are already 40-plus institutional competitors in the market? First State Investments – which has just hired Helene Williamson from F&C Asset Management along with Jan-Markus May, Manuel Cañas and Philip Fielding to run the strategy – did not make the decision for short-term reasons, according to Gary Withers, the firm’s EMEA managing director.
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Features
Take a leaf out of Apple’s book
In the third in a new series of articles, Neeraj Sahai and Amin Rajan argue that robust innovations require robust processes and robust drivers
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Opinion Pieces
Lans Bovenberg & Casper van Ewijk
The EU debt crisis is making further private funding of pensions more desirable. More private retirement saving is necessary to maintain income in old age when public pensions are being cut due to the crisis. Indeed, the implicit debt in the extensive pay-as-you-go (PAYG) arrangements are an important reason behind the European debt crisis. The best way to address the crisis is to cut entitlement programmes in the medium to long term, while leaving more fiscal room to cushion the economy today.
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Features
Seeking regulatory advantage
Gail Moss reports on the progress pension fund associations are making as they seek to influence future legislation
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Country Report
The Nordic Region: Local safe havens: a catch 22
Nordic pension funds have always displayed a bias towards domestically issued fixed income. In the current economic climate, dominated by historically low bond yields and liability-matching, the illiquidity and short maturities that characterise these markets are causing inefficencies in investment models. Nina RÖhrbein reports on the responses of regional players
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Country Report
The Nordic Region: Solvency II New rules of the game
With full implementation now likely in 2014, Solvency II is looming. Rachel Fixsen examines some of the implications for Danish, Norwegian and Swedish pension institutions
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Country Report
The Nordic Region: Investing in cleaner solutions
The outlook for investing in renewables, and cleantech in general, ought to be optimistic as the world is fighting to stop global warming and other climate issues. Pirkko Juntunen assesses the approaches of Nordic institutions
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Features
(Really) high yields
Dramatic repricing has opened up opportunities in high-yield, finds Lynn Strongin Dodds
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Asset Class Reports
Global Equities: Beta made better
Martin Steward asks why some investors are treating long/short equity as an ‘equity replacement’ – and what practical challenges face those who do so
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Special Report
Currency: A game of relativity
The Swiss National Bank’s most recent intervention brought blessed relief to Switzerland’s pension funds. Emma Cusworth assesses the trade-off between capitulation to haven hunters and rising inflation
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Special Report
Currency: Coming together in a crisis
Far from prising the euro-zone apart, Frank Velling argues that current traumas will bind members closer together
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Special Report
Currency: The real thing?
Using emerging market currencies to exploit the ‘Balassa-Samuelson’ hypothesis is a seductive idea, writes Martin Steward. But it might not work in a new world of ‘inflation tolerance’
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Features
Catastrophic year is a signal to buy
More pension funds are investing in insurance-linked securities. Daniel Grieger and Kristina Poliakova argue that recent natural catastrophes have made them even more attractive
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Special Report
Public meets private
Infrastructure is highly visible and long term, so investors need to stay in control of ESG concerns. Nina Röhrbein reports
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Features
A central Asian hub
Kazakhstan’s pension reforms are a success and the country has a sophisticated financial set-up, writes Iain Morse
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Interviews
Clear signals in the fog
When IPE first spoke with Ian Heslop about the post-crisis refinements that Old Mutual Asset Managers (OMAM) had made to its quantitative equity models, it was June of 2011. The sun was shining – literally, and (for quants) metaphorically, too.
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Features
Diary of an Investor: Plain talking
This week I read about a new initiative calling itself the 300 Club.
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Opinion Pieces
Building sector pensions
The European Association of Paritarian Institution’s (AEIP) is working on a continent and sector-wide pension system for the building industry. Francesco Briganti, director of AEIP’s Brussels office, says it aims to create a sector-wide social scheme that could eventually pool pension contributions. Overall benefits would be the spread of best practice in this vast industrial sector.
