BlackRock has entered the retirement-income drawdown market for workplace pensions in response to the end of compulsory annuitisation that came into legislation this month.
The asset manager said the new offering was its first foray into the ‘in retirement’ market.
The new product is set to match up with the firm’s target-date offering, which does not de-risk investments as the member approaches retirement but rather keeps savings invested in multi-asset funds.
The income drawdown solution will only be available initially to current BlackRock workplace pension clients and their members.
Users of the platform can continue using BlackRock’s multi-asset offering or create a portfolio from a range of other investment funds.
An income drawdown solution allows a DC member’s pot to remain invested while periodically drawing down income to spend in retirement.
Such products in the UK were limited to those with large capital values in DC savings.
However, they are expected to become much more popular now annuitisation is no longer compulsory.
BlackRock said the annual charge for using the core multi-asset fund for its income drawdown product was 41 basis points, with this differing should other investment funds be added.
In other news, the £79m (€110m) Aberdeen City Council Transport Fund has selected Aberdeen Asset Management for a dynamic de-risking solution.
The pension fund for the former public sector transport workers in Northeast Scotland had £23.7m in fixed interest assets at the end of the 2014 financial year, all of which was invested in UK and overseas government debt.
Before the latest mandate, Aberdeen Asset Management managed 99.6% of the pension fund’s assets, as at the end of March 2014.
The fund also holds a further £20.4m in overseas unit trusts pooled investment funds and £29.7m in public equities.
No comments yet