All Opinion Pieces articles – Page 6
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Opinion PiecesCross-border pensions: a better taxation model
When members of the European Union accession generation from central and eastern European (CEE) countries were young they used to dream of visiting Santa Claus in Lapland. As travel abroad was not permitted and communications were not developed, they wrote letters and waited impatiently for their presents to arrive.
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Opinion PiecesAustralian funds jostle for slice of energy transition market
Australia’s largest integrated power generator and energy retailer, Origin, lost out on becoming a cornerstone investment in the US$15bn (€13.7bn) Brookfield Global Transition Fund after a failed A$20bn (€12.2bn) attempt by a Brookfield-led consortium to take over Origin last year.
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Opinion PiecesOpponents of Dutch pension reform can’t agree
The Dutch parliamentary elections of 22 November not only resulted in a historic victory for Geert Wilders. The record loss of the governing coalition also meant the new Pension Act no longer has majority support in parliament.
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Opinion PiecesCorporate pensions: a close eye on yields in 2024
The final two months of 2023 saw a return to form for global fixed income and equities, with respectable single and double-digit numbers in each case. After a false start in early 2023, at least for a multitude of asset forecasters, bonds were finally back in the final months of last year.
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Opinion PiecesGuaranteed retirement income and AI: key themes for the US in 2024
The three major 2024 trends in the US retirement industry, according to senior industry figures interviewed by IPE, are: Plan sponsors will continue to expand financial wellness programmes and explore optional provisions of the new pension law SECURE 2.0. Plan participants will up their demand for guaranteed income and ...
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Opinion PiecesWhy DC pensions should choose private equity as first step into illiquids
Governments, regulators, central banks and even trustees are talking about illiquid investments and the productive economy. This is correctly driven by an underlying belief that illiquid assets can improve overall portfolio risk-adjusted returns. But most importantly, if defined contribution (DC) trustees are already keen to get behind productive finance, where do they start if they currently allocate nothing to illiquids?
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Opinion PiecesReasons to be cheerful in ESG-land
In 1979 Ian Dury, an influential British musician, released a song called ‘Reasons to be Cheerful, Pt 3’, which quickly became a classic. Let us consider why the world of environmental, social and governance (ESG) investing offers grounds for good cheer in the year ahead, even if it is not as rousing as the song.
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Opinion PiecesPensions are instrumental in Europe’s unfinished capital markets project
This summer will mark 10 years since Jean-Claude Juncker, former EU Commission president, outlined a vision for a European Capital Markets Union (CMU) – a project both uncompleted and still acutely needed.
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Opinion PiecesIBM revives defined benefit pensions in the US
This January 2024 marks an important turning point in the US retirement industry. Technology giant IBM, which has always been seen as a bellwether of American business practices, is keeping its 401(k) plan, but will stop matching contributions of up to 6%.
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Opinion PiecesAustralia's super funds strengthen their voice
A new superannuation advocacy body has been established in Australia. Known as the Super Members Council of Australia (SMC), it will become the voice of Australia’s rapidly-growing profit-to-members super funds.
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Opinion PiecesAgreement on Stability and Growth Pact spells Austerity reload
The reform of the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP) proposed by the European Commission (EC) in March 2023 had been criticised from all sides, but just before Christmas, European finance ministers agreed on new terms. The SGP had been suspended in response to the COVID-19 crisis but comes back into force in 2024.
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Opinion PiecesViewpoint: Unequal voting rights must be phased out
Weakening protections around dual class share structures will not deliver the desired benefits
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Opinion PiecesSecurities litigation can be worth the effort
Pension funds and other institutional investors face an uphill challenge when it comes to managing their investor action responsibilities.
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Opinion PiecesInvestors should focus on debt sustainability
The good news for institutional investors as 2024 approaches is that central banks seem to have accomplished something remarkable. Inflation is falling in the US and Europe after rising to levels not seen for decades, thanks to what have been among the fastest and sharpest rate hikes. Economic growth has held up, at least in the US. Many economists expect a soft landing there, and a mild recession in Europe.
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Opinion PiecesWill social partners carve a new role for themselves in pensions?
Social partnership can mean different things in many countries, or very little at all in others. The concept resonates most in continental Europe, where a tripartite framework of social-market capitalism has taken root since the second world war, in which corporatist decision-making involving government, labour and employer voices is entrenched.
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Opinion PiecesInvestors could do more to boost German start-ups
The German constitutional court’s ruling that the government’s reallocation of €60bn worth of debt to the country’s Climate and Transformation Fund is unlawful was a blow. But there was also also some welcome news last month.
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Opinion PiecesElection result is bad news for the pension sector
NSC, the new political party that made headlines in this publication with its controversial plan to block pension funds from converting DB pensions to DC without explicit consent from members, did not win the landslide victory that many pension executives feared. But they probably did not get a good night’s sleep anyway.
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Opinion PiecesSuper funds voice corporate governance concerns with Australian business
At its recent annual general meeting in Melbourne, Qantas, Australia’s national carrier, was lambasted by irate shareholders over a litany of grievances, not least the role of chairman Richard Goyder and the board over what shareholders saw as the mismanagement of the airline.
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Opinion PiecesActive management is back on the menu for US pensions
Rising rates and market volatility are forcing US pension funds to rethink their approach to passive and active investing. They are realising that their US stock portfolios are not diversified enough to help protect against a correction. But change may not come so fast.
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Opinion PiecesIreland – future pensions tiger
Ireland stands a few policy steps away from the creation of a serious first and second-pillar pensions architecture that will improve the country’s international standing in terms of retirement provision.
