August 2019

16Aug

Delaying Retirement: Progress and Challenges of Active Ageing in Europe, the United States and Japan

Dirk Hofacker, Moritz Hess, Stefanie Konig To a backdrop of ageing societies, pension crises and labour market reforms, this book investigates how the policy shift from early retirement to active ageing has affected individual retirement behaviour. Focusing on eleven European countries, the United States and Japan, it brings together leading international experts to analyze recent changes in pension systems. Their findings demonstrate that there has been a fundamental transition in pension policies and a steep increase in...

August 16, 2019
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07Aug

Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund to Support ADB’s Green Projects

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) and Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund (GPIF) recently formed a partnership to support green project financing through investments in ADB’s green bonds. “We are pleased to collaborate with GPIF on this important initiative that promotes environment-related investments in Asia and the Pacific and is closely aligned with ADB’s development mandate,” ADB President Mr. Takehiko Nakao said. ADB issues green bonds to finance projects in the Asia and Pacific region that help its developing member...

August 7, 2019
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02Aug

World’s Biggest Pension Fund Adds $2.4 Billion

The world’s biggest pension fund posted its second straight quarterly gain as overseas stocks and bonds generated returns even as most major currencies depreciated against the yen. Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund returned 0.2%, or 257 billion yen ($2.4 billion), in the three months ended June 30, with assets totaling 159.2 trillion yen, it said Friday in Tokyo. Overseas stocks were the fund’s best performing investment, returning 1.3%, followed by overseas debt and domestic bonds. Its Japanese stocks lost...

August 2, 2019
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July 2019

30Jul

The world’s largest pension may be hedging euro and USD risk

Japan's $1.5 trillion public pension fund has begun to put on hedges to protect against USD and EUR declines, according to a Nikkei report published yesterday.The GPIF "has begun a transaction to avoid (hedge) losses associated with fluctuations in foreign exchange rates through fund management with foreign bonds. The target is US dollar and euro denominated bonds, and the balance at the end of March is approximately 1,300 billion yen," the report says. A hedge of that size will be swallowed...

July 30, 2019
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22Jul

Japan faces long-term challenges despite ruling parties’ election success

The third House of Councillors election since the launch of the second administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has ended. And while Abe's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has fewer seats in the upper house than it did before the election, the ruling LDP and its junior coalition partner Komeito managed to maintain the majority in the chamber. One could say that voters indicated a certain measure of support for the long-term administration, which has been in power for 6...

July 22, 2019
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17Jul

Japan’s Answer to Its Pension Problems: Invest Like the U.S.

An official report advising Japanese couples to have at least $185,000 of their own savings for retirement has shaken up an election race and triggered a wave of interest in investing in a country where retirees have long counted chiefly on state pensions. On a recent weekend, a seminar on money management was packed with investment beginners. Mitsugu Kanda, a 28-year-old printing-company salesman, said he was thinking of putting money into stocks to help him accumulate the suggested amount....

July 17, 2019
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June 2019

27Jun

Japan’s workers scramble to make up $187,000 retirement shortfall

A panel report from Japan's financial regulator estimates that an average elderly couple will need an extra 20 million yen ($186,768) to fund a 30-year retirement. That has prompted retail investors, many still in their 20s, to start building up assets on their own. Nikkei surveyed major online brokerages about the changes they have seen since the report was released on June 3. From June 10 to 14, Rakuten Securities saw applications for the Nippon Individual Savings Account program...

June 27, 2019
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26Jun

Japan. Abe survives no-trust vote over pension report scandal

The opposition bloc tabled the motion in Japan's National Diet just before the current parliamentary term was due to come to a close. Given the ample majority enjoyed by Abe's government in both of Japan's parliamentary chambers, the no-confidence vote was never expected to pass. Opposition parties moved against the head of government following a controversial government report earlier this month that underscored the unsustainability of the public pensions system and seemed to encourage private savings as a...

June 26, 2019
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24Jun

Japan. Abe survives censure motion by opposition over pension report

A censure motion against Prime Minister Shinzo Abe submitted by opposition parties over his finance minister's refusal to accept a report suggesting pensions are inadequate for most retirees was voted down in the House of Councillors on Monday. The motion was submitted last Friday as opposition parties launched a last-minute offensive before the end of the current Diet session Wednesday and an upper house election in July to take issue with the Abe government's reluctance to address public concerns...

June 24, 2019
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13Jun

Uproar over $185,000 shortfall puts Japan pension reform on hold

A public uproar has forced the government to retract a controversial report claiming that retired couples reliant on public pensions also need sizable savings, but this backpedaling could further delay Japan's much needed reckoning with the overburdened program. The report compiled by a Financial Services Agency council earlier this month showed that a household with a 65-year-old husband and a 60-year-old wife would need an additional 20 million yen ($184,000) in assets if they live another 30 years. The...

June 13, 2019
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