European real GDP is now projected to contract by 7 per cent in 2020, its biggest decline since World War II, followed by a rebound of 4.7 per cent in 2021. But the recovery’s strength will depend crucially on the course of the pandemic, people’s behavior, and the degree of continued economic policy support.
COVID-19 has exacerbated retirement insecurity and governments need to use this as an opportunity to examine their system inadequacies and make improvements according to David Knox, partner at Mercer and author of the annual Mercer CFA Institute Global Pension index which measures adequacy, sustainability and integrity of 39 retirement systems.
Two of the world’s largest pension funds, the $626 billion Dutch APG and the $660 billion National Pension Service of South Korea (NPS), have joined forces in a partnership to invest in private assets including infrastructure and private real estate.
Albourne Partners, an advocate for fee transparency and flexibility, shows that managers are being rewarded for fee innovation. In a podcast conversation with Amanda White, CEO John Claisse describes the 1 or 30 structure he worked on with Texas Teachers that has revolutionised the conversation around fees.
A new impact investing verification, which uses the same level of rigor that institutional investors approach the due diligence of fund managers, promises to unlock capital flows into impact and build the necessary scale with integrity needed to address the urgent social, environmental, and economic challenges.
The global macro-economic future remains precarious amongst huge uncertainties according to the head of the capital markets department at the IMF, Tobias Adrian, who warns of fragilities including the disconnection between the real economy and financial markets, and growing debt, as potential interruption to future growth.
Top1000funds.com is the market leading news and analysis site for the world’s largest institutional investors. It focuses on leading the global investment industry to continuous improvement through case studies of best practice in governance and decision making, portfolio construction and efficient portfolio management, fees and costs, and sustainable investing.
The publication pushes the industry to question whether status quo processes and behaviours to tackle risks and opportunities will be sufficient in the future, and actively campaigns for diversity, sustainability, transparency, innovation and better alignment of fees in the investment industry.
Top1000funds.com is read by investment professionals in more than 40 countries.
