All Opinion articles – Page 13
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OpinionLiability-driven investing in a low-yield environment
A common refrain from pension scheme sponsors recently is that they “cannot do liability-driven investing in such a low-yield environment”, or that “it makes no sense for our plan to buy bonds in such a low-yield environment”. However, both statements reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of LDI.
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OpinionPPF statistics hint at a different future for DB schemes
The Pension Protection Fund 7800 index figures have been notable, revealing an aggregate funding position of 103.5 per cent with the proportion of schemes enjoying a surplus on the PPF basis far higher than at this point in 2020.
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OpinionThe long road to net zero
Last August, the Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change published a consultation setting out how large institutional investors, such as pension funds, could begin to “decarbonise” their portfolios.
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OpinionWhat should industry know about tomorrow’s pensioners?
As working lives are becoming increasingly heterogeneous and pension contribution levels are directly linked with housing conditions, Pensions Policy Institute head of policy research Daniela Silcock looks at potential solutions that could improve today’s savers retirement options.
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OpinionDon’t wait to be grey to be green
Charles Clarke, client communications lead at BNP Paribas Asset Management, details the challenges ahead for the pensions industry in its mission of switching the economy from stopping polluting to starting rebuilding.
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OpinionIs there anything under the bonnet of govt’s climate policy?
Pensions minister Guy Opperman has recently and proudly announced that the UK is the first major country to require its pension schemes to abide by the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures reporting requirements.
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OpinionPolicing police pensions
For advisers with clients in the police community, it might be tempting to simply dismiss the complaints raised recently by the Pension Challenge group – an independent group representing police officers arguing that the introduction of transitional arrangements to police pensions are discriminatory on the grounds of age — as the unwelcome opinions of a public sector minority.
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OpinionTop 5 considerations for trustees considering residual risk buyout
Despite the Covid-19 pandemic, the UK pensions derisking market has remained resilient, with deal volumes of around £25bn in 2020 and a steady (albeit slower) flow of deals being completed in the early months of 2021. Therefore, it is clear that pension trustees are continuing to think about their derisking plans.
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OpinionSchemes should prepare for new TPR contribution notice regime
The Pension Schemes Act 2021 enhanced the Pensions Regulator’s powers to issue contribution notices, which are orders requiring that money be paid into a pension scheme that has been damaged by behaviour.
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OpinionDon’t ‘do’ pensions? Think again…
Norton Rose Fulbright’s Claire O’Donnell and Julia Chirnside explain how corporates can prepare for the increased notification requirements to the Pensions Regulator that could have an impact for many merger and acquisition transactions.
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OpinionThe answer to climate change is more primary investment
What should the investment industry do if it is serious about addressing climate change?
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OpinionThe winding road to a straight answer
Stephen Lowe, group communications director at Just Group, would like to get some straight answers to the Work and Pensions Committee’s inquiry on why guidance is still not the norm when savers make use of pension freedoms.
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OpinionThere are many roads to Paris – let us not impose a single route to net-zero
Earlier this year, former Bank of England governor Mark Carney had to row back quickly from his claim that Brookfield Asset Management’s investment portfolio was “carbon neutral” on the basis of avoided emissions, despite the fact there is no agreed single definition of a net-zero portfolio.
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OpinionInvestment oversight – trustees should ‘mind the gap’
IC Select managing director Peter Dorward outlines how trustees need to increase the oversight of their investment consultants and fiduciary managers in a way to comply with new regulations.
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OpinionThe defined benefit trustee cost challenge
Isio director Iain McLellan details how defined benefit scheme trustees should spend their increasingly constricted budgets to ensure good governance, and why sponsors should invest in their own scheme’s trustee board.
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OpinionNow is the time for schemes to turn attention to social risk factors
From the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic to growing equality and human rights movements, the past year has brought many significant changes both in terms of behaviour and views relating to social factors.
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OpinionPolicy changes needed to avoid generations of pension inadequacy
Defined contribution pension schemes have taken over defined benefit plans as the main form of pension saving for the UK’s private sector.
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OpinionDriving the ESG agenda through fixed income
Delivering impact-type outcomes has been very much the preserve of equity funds up until now, but times are changing and fixed income is coming more into the mix.
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OpinionLong-term funding: Are we on the right track?
River and Mercantile’s co-head of solutions, Ajeet Manjrekar, details a three-step plan that allows schemes to have a derisking framework consistent with regulatory expectations, while enabling effective decisions.
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OpinionProtecting pensions against pandemic-enhanced cyber criminals
There are three major risks in relation to protecting pensions data, though the pandemic has given a massive boost to cyber criminals who know how to exploit these risks.