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January 2021

Australia. Why we should stick with the 12pc super guarantee rate

By Karen Maley If Treasurer Josh Frydenberg was hoping that the eagerly awaited Callaghan retirement income review might help him resolve the fiendishly difficult political problem of what to do with the superannuation guarantee levy, he'll be deeply disappointed. The Morrison government is facing intense pressure from a group of hardline backbenchers to scrap the long-legislated increase in employers' compulsory contribution to their workers' super from 9.5 per cent of wages to 12 per cent by 2025. Read more @AFR

Pension Reform Primer : Issues, Challenges, Options and Arguments in Pension Reform

By World Bank The World Bank Pension Reform Primer aims to provide a comprehensive toolkit for policy makers on designing and implementing pension reform. It is based on continuously updated information from countries that have introduced reforms emphasizing the role of privately-managed individual retirement accounts. Their experience offers a number of useful lessons for policy makers elsewhere. The Bank set out a conceptual framework for fundamental pension reform in "Averting the Old Age Crisis: Policies to Protect the Old...

U.K. government cuts administration fees for smallest DC pots

U.K. defined contribution plans with £100 ($136) in assets or less will be exempt from paying administration fees, the government said Wednesday. A consultation into fee cap rules aimed at protecting automatically enrolled plan participants from paying high fees resulted in the government keeping the fee cap at its current level set at 0.75% of assets under management and administration. The consultation was launched in June. However, due to additional concerns raised by respondents to the consultation around the...

India. New fee structure opens the doors wider for pension fund managers: PFRDA chief

‘Increased fees will ensure both profitability and investment in infra’ Pension regulator PFRDA has now taken a big initiative to revamp the pension funds management structure in India and position the industry for strong decadal growth that could take the overall assets under management of the National Pension System (NPS) to ₹30-lakh crore by 2030. The regulator has now come out with a new Request for Proposal (RFP) for selection of sponsors of pension funds for NPS, throwing open the door for...

January 2021

Supervising mandatory funded pension systems: issues and challenges

By Gustavo Demarco, Rafae Rofman, & Edward Whitehouse The regulation and supervision of pension funds is a critical part of building public confidence in a funded-pension system. This paper argues that confidence is best bolstered by an independent, autonomous and transparent supervision agency, particularly when previous systems had failed. The choice between proactive and reactive supervision depends on previous experience of selfregulation in a country’s financial sector. The paper examines four key areas of supervision in detail: institutional, financial, membership and...

Collecting and transferring pension contributions

By Rafael Rofman & Gustavo Demarco Collecting social security contributions is an important operational issue in all types of pension systems. Many regimes are plagued by poor compliance and weak, inefficient administration. Some countries have tried to introduce an automatic incentive to contribute by moving systems closer to"actuarial fairness,"where pension benefits are more strictly related to individual contributions. Examples include the systems of individual accounts introduced in a range of countries in Latin America and Eastern Europe. But in these...

December 2020

US. Multiemployer Pensions Update: A Lump Of Coal In Their Christmas Stockings

How do you write about something that didn’t happen? On Sunday night, President Trump, after much delay, signed the combo Covid-relief and omnibus appropriations bill. Since I had been bookmarking a variety of articles that anticipated the inclusion of retirement related provisions in that bill, and even more voices calling for the need to resolve the multiemployer pension crisis (which I myself last addressed in October), I looked at the text as soon as it was made available, went...

ESMA advises fresh postponement of pension fund central clearing duty

The EU financial markets watchdog has recommended the European Commission extend until June 2022 the current exemption for pension funds from the obligation to use central clearing for derivatives. Its stance follows a public consultation to collect more data as well as views from a wide range of stakeholders about issues surrounding potential central clearing solutions for pension schemes. ESMA said it was convinced of the benefits of a broad adoption of the clearing obligation for pension funds, but...

Australian Regulator Questions 10 Pensions Over Poor Performance

Australia’s prudential regulator will consider using its enforcement powers on 10 default retirement savings plans that were found to be among the nation’s worst performers for a second year. The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority said Friday it is assessing whether the eight trustees managing the plans have failed their obligations to members and will seek information on how they’re addressing the underperformance. APRA will then determine what action will be taken, including whether to use its power to force...

US. Labor Department Finishes Fiduciary Rule for Retirement Plans

The Labor Department completed on Tuesday the Trump administration’s fiduciary rule governing advice affecting the trillions of dollars in retirement accounts. Read also US. Workers Tap Retirement Savings as a Last Resort But because the regulation won’t go into effect until after President-elect Joe Biden takes office, it is likely to be revised by the new administration. Read also Divest or direct? Pension funds weigh their options in the climate crisis “I don’t expect it to survive in its current form,”...