January 2020

UK. Pensions dashboards: Minister urges providers to get data in shape

Pensions minister Guy Opperman has urged companies to help pave the way for the dashboards – apps to help people keep track of their savings . The pensions dashboards will give people information about their pensions via a smartphone app, and have been billed as the solution to bring retirement money “into the digital age”. However, they require secure and accurate data from providers. Schemes will be forced to supply this under new laws, but Opperman said...

December 2019

Realistic Expectations and Limitations to Consumer-Facing Robo-tic Advisors

By Dirk Cotton, Neville Francis We present a benchmark life-cycle simulation model (RFSM) that incorporates the financial, demographic, and mortality positions of retired households. By adjusting several features we nest a specific type of consumer-facing (generic) robo model that attempts to minimize the user's workload by imputing key inputs. We calibrate both models under robo policies using the Health and Retirement data for our benchmark model and robo-imputed data for the Generic-Robo model. Our findings indicate that retirees using...

Perceived Precautionary Savings Motives: Evidence from FinTech

By Francesco D'Acunto (Boston College), Thomas Rauter (University of Chicago - Booth School of Business), Christoph Scheuch (Vienna Graduate School of Finance; Vienna University of Economics and Business), Michael Weber (University of Chicago - Finance) We study the consumption response to the provision of credit lines to individuals that previously did not have access to credit combined with the possibility to elicit directly a large set of preferences, beliefs, and motives. As expected, users react to the availability of credit...

Managing Pension Risk With Amazon Managed Blockchain

Everyone is familiar with insurance, whether it's for a home, an automobile, or healthcare. The concept is simple: Individuals or entities pool their money to protect the group against risks. Fewer, however, are familiar with the concept of reinsurance, but it's equally important for the smooth functioning of our financial markets and the protection of insured entities and individuals around the world. Reinsurance is what the name implies: insurance on insurance. Insurers or other entities providing insurance-like solutions take...

November 2019

Leveraging AI To Accelerate Precision Health For Longevity

People over 50 are the fastest growing demographic group worldwide. This creates both opportunities and challenges for the global economy and healthcare systems. The Longevity Industry, which provides products and services for those aged over 50 is becoming a multi-trillion-dollar industry. There are currently 260 companies, 250 investors, 10 non-profits, and 10 research labs in the Longevity Industry in the UK alone. In the next decade, Longevity policies enacted by governments, and changes in the financial industry will transform...

The Tech Behind DC Plan Administration Solutions

As a plan sponsor, you know what entity provides administration services and recordkeeping for your defined contribution (DC) retirement plan—whether it’s a recordkeeping provider or third-party administrator (TPA). But do you know what is behind all of the processing your recordkeeping provider or TPA does? There are a number of technology providers in the retirement plan market that offer certain processes for recordkeepers with their own proprietary or legacy systems, as well as end-to-end recordkeeping for TPAs. According to...

The Disruptive Impact of FinTech on Retirement Systems

By Julie Agnew, Olivia S. Mitchell This volume examines how technology is transforming financial applications, and how FinTech promises a similar revolution in the retirement planning processes. Robo-advisors and mobile savings apps are a few harbingers of innovations to come. Nevertheless, these changes will bring with them new ethical and regulatory considerations, design challenges related to promoting adoption by an older population less trusting of technology, and concerns over data security and privacy. Our contributors take stock of the disruptive...

How China and the World Reacted to Xi Jinping’s Blockchain Comments

China’s President, Xi Jinping, sent waves through the industry with his speech on blockchain technology last week.  The leader of the Communist Party of China reaffirmed the trend of the past five years with his keynote speech that welcomed the dawn of blockchain technology in the country. He told members of the party: “WE MUST TAKE THE BLOCKCHAIN AS AN IMPORTANT BREAKTHROUGH FOR INDEPENDENT INNOVATION OF CORE TECHNOLOGIES.” Many provinces across China had already been utilizing the technology behind cryptocurrencies but now Xi wants...

October 2019

UK. Delivering pension dashboards

The inclusion of the pension dashboards among the announcements in the Queen’s Speech on October 14 was an important step forward for this initiative, reflecting support from the government and enabling the industry to move forward to deliver dashboards with renewed vigour and certainty. Read also UK. Retirement income gender gap is the biggest in a decade While it has been pointed out that a lack of government majority in parliament means the proposals contained in the pensions bill might...

Chinese government uses facial recognition app to pay out pensions

A facial recognition app, Laolai.com, is being used by China's Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, to ascertain pension payouts and avoid fraud. Read also US senator plans Bill to block Federal Pensions investing in China The Laolai mobile app is designed to enable elderly citizens to prove their identity in order to receive social security benefits. Some 250 million retirees now use the app, which was developed into an online platform for a wide range of services for...