All Opinion Pieces articles – Page 11
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Opinion PiecesEuropean authorities must focus on derivatives risk
Opinions may differ on whether Brexit has had a positive or negative impact on either of the parties involved. However, it could be argued that an idiosyncratic event such as the liquidity crisis that took place in the United Kingdom at the end of September could have been averted, had the country been part of the bloc. Investors lost confidence in the UK government, now more isolated than before Brexit, and its ability to maintain its fiscal balance, after the announcement of a massive fiscal spending plan at the end of September. That sent yields on UK Gilts soaring and led to a spiralling lack of liquidity, as pension funds rushed to post collateral on their interest-rate derivative positions.
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Opinion PiecesGuest viewpoint: Why and how we need to change the conversation about pension reform
In their new book, Power and Prediction, on the disruptive economics of artificial intelligence (AI), authors Ajay Agrawal, Joshua Gans and Avi Goldfarb write about the ‘between times’ between an important new discovery and the time it takes for that discovery to go mainstream. In 1879, Thomas Edison demonstrated the potential of the electric light bulb to change the world, yet 20 years later only 3% of US households had electricity. It would take another 20 years for that number to reach 50% of the population. For electricity the ‘between times’ were 40 years. This prompted the authors to wonder how long the ‘between times’ will be for AI.
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Opinion PiecesCOP15: Biodiversity develops investment ecosystem
Biodiversity is fast catching up with climate change as a priority for investors and supervisors, and developments last year have set the stage for a productive 2023.
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Opinion PiecesUS: Republican House will not divert from SECURE 2.0
The new Republican majority in the US House of Representatives is not large enough to have a significant impact on the retirement industry.
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Opinion PiecesViewpoint: Beyond Article 9, is there a regulation to promote real sustainability?
Recent events have shown how anticipating forthcoming clarification on the application of a text that has been published since 2019 has created such confusion that many asset managers have had to reclassify a large number of their funds from Article 9 to Article 8.
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Opinion PiecesViewpoint: Why LGBTIQ+ inclusion should matter to investors
We would like to thank Frank Wagemans of Achmea IM for his extensive input, which we highly appreciate
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Opinion PiecesViewpoint: Gilts crisis won’t undermine attractions of private markets for long-term investors
Many of the government’s ambitions to reboot growth in the UK economy require solutions which private assets are well equipped and prepared to provide in a timely manner
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Opinion PiecesViewpoint: Alternative risk premia strategies stand tall amid turmoil
While bond and equity markets have been pummeled in 2022, Alternative Risk Premia strategies have at last been able to demonstrate their diversification prowess. Will this year’s performance restore investor confidence in these strategies after the painful results of 2020?
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Opinion PiecesViewpoint: Net-zero-aligned investment in fossil fuels
Incentivising carbon capture would free institutional investors from having to make decisions about the climate
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Opinion PiecesMeloni grapples with Italy’s pension woes
Reforms usually follow general elections, regardless of the political system. Italy is no different. The most generous country in Europe in terms of pension payments, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Italy spends the equivalent of 15.6% of GDP on pensions.
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Opinion PiecesDutch pensions reform: A never ending story
In the last two years, nearly all my contributions for this section have been about the ongoing reform of the Dutch pension system, which will involve the transfer of defined-benefit (DB) accruals to a defined-contribution (DC) setting.
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Opinion PiecesTime to rethink defined contribution pensions design
This year is shaping up to be the worst for investment returns since before the great financial crisis, according to IPE’s latest performance analysis of the leading European pension funds.
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Opinion PiecesGuest viewpoint: The UK pensions sector should be more aggressive on consolidation
UK pension assets across both defined benefit (DB) and defined contribution (DC) funds are too fragmented, and our schemes, even the biggest, are sub-scale. Consolidation is not the answer to everything, but it is a big part of the solution.
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Opinion PiecesAustralia: Supers face A$500m tax hit
In the lead-up to the first budget by a Labor government in 12 years, speculation was rife about what the new Australian government might have in store for the superannuation sector.
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Opinion PiecesCOP27: more questions than answers but reasons to hope
Despite the cynicism around COP27 last month, there were some potentially major developments for investors. Excitingly, a number of them address what’s often ignored in climate finance discussions: moving money.
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Opinion PiecesViewpoint: Asset allocation – factoring inflation
As inflation keeps beating records, real incomes remain under pressure and the standard approaches to diversification are challenged
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Opinion PiecesViewpoint: COP27 needs to have the water crisis at its heart
Measuring and disclosing risks, opportunities and impacts of economic activities is critical to support the transition to a sustainable economy
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Opinion PiecesViewpoint: Dutch pension funds should consider the costs of convexity
Pension funds should consider adjusting their hedging policy as convexity doesn’t seem to payoff anymore
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Opinion PiecesViewpoint: ESMA’s latest shot at ‘pre-hedging’ must now bring a clear set of rules
With a direct and significant impact on the prices that pension and other funds receive for the securities they buy and sell, pre-hedging is a key market cleanliness issue with broad implications for the investment industry, but also the end-investor and the public at large. It should not be overlooked this time around for it could become a LIBOR moment for market confidence.
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Opinion PiecesNext up for Switzerland: second pillar reform?
The narrow majority of Swiss citizens voting to reform the country’s statutory (AHV) pension system in a referendum on 23 September (52.2%) could create momentum to bring about changes to the second pillar.
