Italy’s Fondo Pensione Complementare per la Famiglia (Fondo Famiglia), the potentially 15m strong pension fund for Italian housewives and part-time workers, is sounding out potential partnerships with similar European family organisations that could create a giant pan-European retirement scheme for the social sector.
Lorenzo Gasparrini, a member of the board at Fondo Famiglia, comments: “ We are just ready to make similar funds like FondoFamiglia with other associations in Holland, England or France or so on.
The Fondo Famiglia, created by the Italian union DonnEuropee Federdcasalinghe, was given its operational green light from the country’s pension fund authority COVIP at the end of last year.
Its potential domestic membership of fifteen million people includes nine million housewives and six million part-time and temporary workers.
Gasparrini says subscribtions to the fund began in October and that by December membership had reached 5,000 people.
“We stopped subscription then because we wanted to choose a depositary bank, administrative society and financial investors. A decision on the fund’s custodian, he notes, will be taken at the end of June, while the selection of investment managers will be made in mid-July.
Initially, Fondo Famiglia will be run as a ‘monocomparto’ balanced fund with investment split 60% in bonds and 40% equities.
“We will choose two managers, one we hope will be European,” says Gasparrini.
“In the second year we will become a multi-compartment fund and then we will choose managers for the US, Pacific basin etc.”