epn: European Pensions & Investment News articles from November 2002

epn: European Pensions & Investment News archives from November 2002

News: ABP looks to hire in investment overhaul.
November 25, 2002... THE E147BN ABP Pension Fund is looking for high-alpha emerging market and small-caps managers as part of its drive to enhance alpha-generating equity strategies. The fund is also hiring staff as part of this strategy. It is in the process of...

News: EU Directive to face opposition in Parliament.
November 25, 2002... The EU's Council of Ministers is expected to formally adopt the directive on pan-European pension funds this month, but the legislation is set for a tough challenge in its next parliamentary reading before the end of this year. Othmar Karas is...

News: On top form for assets.
November 25, 2002... Barclays Global Investors (BGI) is still top of the league of European pension assets according to Mercer Investment Consulting. The Mercer Investment Consulting European Pension Fund Managers Guide 2002 also saw Schroder Investment...

News: Externalisation pushes Spanish plan assets towards E20bn.
November 25, 2002... Over half a million Spanish workers are now members of occupational pension plans, with assets worth E18.2bn saved for them. These are the latest figures from the finance ministry's pensions and savings unit, which has been tracking the...

Scheme News: Regulator promises to enforce funding.
November 25, 2002... The Dutch pensions and insurance regulator intends to show a strong hand in holding the country's retirement plans to new funding rules. In an effort to shore up solvency by closing a projected E23bn funding gap within a year, the PvK has...

Scheme News: Norwegian fund opens door to world exposure.
November 25, 2002... The Norwegian Petroleum Fund will complete its exposure to all sectors in the FTSE World Index with the tender of mandates worth a total of more than US$1.25 bn (E1.24bn). The NKr776bn (E106bn) fund is tendering active management equity...

News: Active equals success.
November 25, 2002... Barclays Global Investors (BGI) is still top of the league of European pension assets, after it saw an asset increase of 21% from 2001, according to figures from Mercer Investment Consulting. This continued increase in business was...

News: Siemens shores up fund with e2.6bn.
November 25, 2002... Siemens AG has announced total contributions of E2.6bn to its German, British and US pension funds, following the dramatic underperformance of Infineon shares, which at one point last year accounted for 15% of the entire investment portfolio...

People on the move: HBW partnership.
November 25, 2002... Hewitt Bacon & Woodrow has strengthened its investment manager research team with the recruitment of Ian Peart and Dean Wetton. Peart, who was previously head of the pan-European equity team at Friends Ivory & Sime, will be joining as a senior...

People on the move: Bos tops for pensions.
November 25, 2002... The E50bn industrywide pension fund for Dutch care workers has appointed Else Bos as director of third-party management for operations and staff at its investment operation. Bos was previously chief operating officer and chief financial officer...

News: Consistency needed in SRI questionnaires.
November 25, 2002... SRI ratings agencies and index providers should standardise elements of their environmental and social responsibility questionnaires, according to the corporate social responsibility director of a leading US chemicals concern. Dow...

News Analysis: Lasting the distance.
November 25, 2002... The fact that Enron was a member of the Business Council for Sustainable Energy underlines the fact that the mere outward appearance of good corporate citizenship cannot necessarily exercise a positive effect on a company's bottom line in the...

Comment & Analysis: Increasing the odds of coming out on top.
November 25, 2002... Have you ever felt that there are certain games where the dice are just loaded against you? Roulette, or horse racing might be a couple of obvious ones. And haven't you wondered what life would be like if you could turn the odds around and have...

Comment & Analysis: Longevity remedy not so simple.
November 25, 2002... Pensions are a hot issue. Not only because of slumping markets - which have had a great impact on the funding positions of many pension schemes in Europe and in the US - but also because of the growing demographic imbalances that are plaguing...

Leader: Having the appetite to crunch numbers.
November 25, 2002... If one wants a guide to the future of the asset management industry, one could do a lot worse than to analyse the model portfolios of investment banks. For the latest figures before going to press, Morgan Stanley had no US or European...

Survey: Nordic region - Testing the water.
November 25, 2002... Denmark's one-year-old centre-right government is so enamoured with Sweden's liberalised pension system that it is now trying to follow suit. The country's largest pension fund is the E33bn Labour Market Supplementary Scheme (ATP) and the...

Survey: Nordic region - Even older age pensioners.
November 25, 2002... For some years, the social partners in Finland have been involved in negotiations on two major projects within the field of occupational pensions. First, Finnish policy makers have been concentrating on postponing the average retirement age by...

Research Update: Older employees working overtime.
November 25, 2002... In lifestyle portfolios, individuals slowly reduce their exposure to risk as they approach retirement. Professors Zvi Bodie and William Samuelson of Boston University along with Robert Merton of Harvard Business School argued in 1992 that...

Fund Portrait: Germany's MetallRente - Welding trade unions with employers.
November 25, 2002... MetallRente - Germany's new open pension fund aimed primarily at the metal and electricity industry - could become one of Europe's biggest pension funds - assuming Germans take to private pension saving in the way that they have historically...

Pensions Snapshot: Slovakia.
November 25, 2002... Slovakian pension reform is far from complete. State provision has been cut back since the mid 1990s and individual savings funds introduced with only mixed success. The design of a compulsory, pre-funded second-pillar provision is under...

Pensions Snapshot: Slovakia - In brief.
November 25, 2002... - "Third-pillar provision needs further tightening up," warns Iain Batty a partner at law firm Cameron McKenna's Warsaw office. "It remains unclear about the role the founders and seed capital contributors to these funds. Neither is there...