November 2021

Australia. Global Managers Circle as Retiring Boomers Cash In Billions

Almost two million Australians will soon start drawing down A$300 billion ($218 billion) in savings as they leave the workforce, and that’s providing opportunities for domestic, and increasingly overseas, asset managers as retirement costs soar at the quickest pace in seven years. Read also UK. How will the new pension transfer restrictions work? “The decumulation problem is the trickiest problem in finance to solve because everyone’s going to have a different set of needs and requirements and aspirations in retirement,” Richard...

Aging China outlines plan to improve elderly care services

China is urging some local governments to embark on pilot programmes next year to improve medical and care services for the elderly, with the goal of rolling out the scheme nationwide in 2023. Read also India’s fertility rate falls below replacement level. What it means. Of the 31 provinces, regions and municipalities in mainland China, 15 should launch their local pilot schemes for better medical and care services for the elderly next year, the National Health Commission (NHC) said in a...

Pension funds can steer next level growth and development in Nigeria

In retrospect, it is widely attested that an active pension ecosystem effectively congregating players – a regulator, administrators, custodians, public and private sector employers and working-class persons across several age groups – is well established in Nigeria. The maturity of this industry relative to more advanced economies of the world like the US or the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development nonetheless, the pension industry globally has displayed great resilience, navigating the turbulence and whirlwinds: macroeconomic shocks, economic downturns,...

Move to hinterland triggers brain drain at Korea’s mega pension fund

Earlier this year, Lee left her fund management job at South Korea's national pension fund, the world's third-largest, fed up with long commutes between her home in Seoul and her office in Jeonju, 200 kilometers away. For four years, Lee lived in a studio apartment in Jeonju, a city of 658,000, on weekdays, and traveled back to Seoul for the weekend. She feared her family would break up if she didn't make the hard decision to quit. Lee is one of...

Kenya. Safaricom lifts pension earnings to four-year high

Pensioners have enjoyed the highest returns from investments in four years helped by the big gains on the shares of Safaricom and large banks, which make up the bulk of the pension industry equities investments. Pension funds surveyed by fund administrator Zamara and Actuarial Services East Africa (Actserv) show a return of 15.1 percent on investments for the one year to September 2021, the highest since they reported a 15.5 percent return in 2017. Read also Ghana. Parliament asked to address...

COP26 Special Report on Climate Change and Health

By World Health Organization The 10 recommendations in the COP26 Special Report on Climate Change and Health propose a set of priority actions from the global health community to governments and policy makers, calling on them to act with urgency on the current climate and health crises. The recommendations were developed in consultation with over 150 organizations and 400 experts and health professionals. They are intended to inform governments and other stakeholders ahead of the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26)...

Ethics of the Environment

By Julia M. Puaschunder Globalization leveraged pressure on contemporary society. Today's most pressing social dilemmas regarding climate change demand for inclusive solutions that marry the idea of sustainable growth with environmental economics. Understanding the bounds of environmental limits to avoid ethical downfalls beyond the control of singular nation states infringing on intergenerational equity – the fairness to provide an at least as favorable standard of living to future generations as enjoyed today – has become a blatant demand. In a...

Early Retirement of Employees in Demanding Jobs: Evidence from a German Pension Reform

By Johannes Geyer, Svenja Lorenz, Thomas Zwick & Mona Bruns Early retirement options are usually targeted at employees at risk of not reaching their regular retirement age in employment. An important at-risk group comprises employees who have worked in demanding jobs for many years. This group may be particularly negatively affected by the abolition of early retirement options. To measure differences in labor market reactions of employees in low- and high-demand jobs, we exploit the quasi-natural experiment of a cohort-specific...

Asset Allocation: Glide Path Design for Target Date Retirement Funds

By Thomas Present, Sharon Persyn In this thesis, we discuss and compare target date retirement fund strategies that have been used in recent literature. These strategies include the 100% equity, glide path, maximum drawdown, risk budget and target return strategy. We conduct sensitivity analyses in order to obtain optimal parameters for the different strategies. We first compare the strategies with rebalancing between two asset classes: equity (Russell 1000) as the risky asset and bonds (10Y US government bonds) as the...

South Africa. Government pension fund freezes R70 billion mandate with PIC

The Government Employees Pension Fund, Africa’s biggest pension fund, said it may take as long as a year to negotiate a new mandate with Public Investment Corporation that will allow it to enter into new unlisted investment deals. The PIC oversees a R70 billion unlisted investment fund for the GEPF, but its mandate lapsed in March, said Musa Mabesa, the GEPF’s principal chief executive. While deals initiated before it ended can be completed, new ones can’t be concluded, he said. The...