Pension funds and value-based generational accounting

2003 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 295-325 ◽  
Author(s):  
EDUARD H. M. PONDS
Keyword(s):  
Risk Sharing ◽  
Pension Fund ◽  
Economic Value ◽  
Pension Plan ◽  
Pension Funds ◽  
Defined Benefit ◽  
Funding Policy ◽  
Generational Accounting ◽  
Alternative Funding ◽  
Ex Post

The raison d'être of wage-indexed defined benefit pension funds is to provide insurance against standard-of-living risk after retirement, based on intergenerational risk sharing. Pension funds necessarily have to accept mismatch risk in providing this kind of insurance. Mismatch risk taken by the pension fund is risk for the fund's stakeholders. We combine the value-based approach and the method of generational accounting to analyze the economic value of the stakes of the different generations and the issue of who gains and who loses (transfers of value between generations) from alternative funding and indexation policies. Rules concerning the allocation of a funding surplus or funding shortage in particular are decisive to the direction and to the size of transfers of value between stakeholders. We put forward two criteria to evaluate alternative policies employed by pension funds: the funding policy and allocation rules must give an ex ante fair compensation for risk taken by generations and the sustainability of a pension plan must be checked with respect to ex post redistributive effects for current and future generations. Value-based generational accounting provides a tool for testing a pension fund policy for these two criteria.

scholarly journals PENSION FUND RESTORATION POLICY IN GENERAL EQUILIBRIUM

2019 ◽  
Vol 24 (7) ◽  
pp. 1785-1814
Author(s):  
Pim B. Kastelein ◽  
Ward E. Romp
Keyword(s):  
Risk Sharing ◽  
Pension Fund ◽  
Pension Funds ◽  
New Keynesian ◽  
Defined Benefit ◽  
Defined Contribution ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
Keynesian Model ◽  
Intergenerational Risk Sharing ◽  
The Business Cycle

When the financial positions of pension funds worsen, regulations prescribe that pension funds reduce the gap between their assets (invested contributions) and their liabilities (accumulated pension promises). This paper quantifies the business cycle effects and distributional implications of various types of restoration policies. We extend a canonical New-Keynesian model with a tractable demographic structure and, as a novelty, a flexible pension fund framework. Fund participants accumulate inflation-indexed or non-indexed benefits and funding adequacy is restored by revaluing previously accumulated pension wealth (Defined Contribution (DC)) or changing the pension fund contribution rate on labor income (Defined Benefit (DB)). Economies with DC pension funds respond similarly to adverse capital quality shocks as economies without pension funds. DB pension funds, however, distort labor supply decisions and exacerbate economic fluctuations. While DB pension funds achieve intergenerational risk-sharing, welfare analyses indicate that the negative effects of the induced distortions are sizeable.

Rethinking Pension Fund Investment Strategies

1994 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 397-409 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Richard Brownlee ◽  
S. Brooks Marsha
Keyword(s):  
Financial Reporting ◽  
Pension Fund ◽  
Pension Plan ◽  
Pension Funds ◽  
Investment Strategies ◽  
Fixed Income ◽  
Fixed Income Securities ◽  
Economic Entity ◽  
Tax Arbitrage ◽  
Fund Investment

This paper addresses the need for companies to reexamine their pension fund investment strategies because of certain changes that occurred during the 1980s that enhanced the attractiveness of fixed-income securities. Of primary importance was the issuance of a new pension accounting standard that substantially changed the determination of annual pension expense, pension plan asset and liability recognition, and pension footnote disclosures. Both the concepts and the information resulting from the pension standard have promoted a more integrative perspective of the relationship between pension funds and their corporate sponsors. This broadened perception of companies and their pension funds comprising a single economic entity has important financial consequences for corporate managements and capital providers. One such consequence pertains to pension portfolios. Fixed-income securities become a more desirable pension fund investment for two principal reasons: they reduce financial reporting risk without increasing economic risk and they are an integral component of corporate tax arbitrage, a strategy initially proposed by Fischer Black in the early 1980s.

scholarly journals Pension fund trustee competence: decision making in problems relevant to investment practice

2006 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 91-110 ◽  
Author(s):  
GORDON L. CLARK ◽  
EMIKO CAERLEWY-SMITH ◽  
JOHN C. MARSHALL
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Pension Fund ◽  
Service Providers ◽  
Investment Decisions ◽  
Pension Plan ◽  
Defined Benefit ◽  
Defined Benefit Pension Plan ◽  
Fund Governance ◽  
Psychology Literature

Government-sponsored inquiries into trustee competence, and legislation regarding the protocols and practice of trustee decision making, have raised questions about the competence of trustees to make investment decisions consistent with the long-term interest of defined benefit pension plan beneficiaries. In this paper, we report the results of an analysis of trustee competence in solving problems relevant to their investment responsibilities. Based upon a set of widely recognized problems drawn from the psychology literature, we assess their discount functions, their willingness to risk their own money and others' money, their appreciation of probability, and their use of evidence to solve problems. For comparison, where appropriate we report the results of the same testing regime applied to a group of Oxford undergraduates. Our goals are fourfold: first, to demonstrate the nature of trustee competence in decision making; second, to demonstrate the range of trustee responses to problems relevant to investment; third, to assess trustees' risk appetites in relation to their own and others' money; and fourth, to draw implications from these results for the governance of trustee boards and their relationships with advisers and service providers. It is shown that trustee competence is surprisingly heterogeneous, and the lack of common approaches to problems relevant to investment practice has significant implications for fund governance.

Measuring and explaining implicit risk sharing in defined benefit pension funds

2014 ◽  
Vol 46 (17) ◽  
pp. 1996-2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacob A. Bikker ◽  
Thijs Knaap ◽  
Ward E. Romp
Keyword(s):  
Risk Sharing ◽  
Pension Funds ◽  
Defined Benefit

Pension fund governance: expertise and organizational form

2004 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 233-253 ◽  
Author(s):  
GORDON L. CLARK
Keyword(s):  
Pension Fund ◽  
Codes Of Conduct ◽  
Pension Funds ◽  
Defined Benefit ◽  
Defined Contribution ◽  
Internal Governance ◽  
Codes Of Practice ◽  
Anglo American ◽  
Fund Governance ◽  
Equitable Treatment

Responsible for the welfare of beneficiaries, pension funds have many tasks and functions. Consequently, their governance and regulation are issues of public concern with direct bearing on the interests of stakeholders and ultimately the performance of Anglo-American financial markets. Subject to common law expectations regarding proper trustee behaviour, also important are statutory requirements regarding the equitable treatment of beneficiaries and the management of assets and liabilities. At one level, discretion is an essential attribute of the trust institution – trustees act on behalf of others not so well placed to manage their own long-term welfare because of lack of knowledge and/or ability. At another level, pension funds are presumably regulated by a well-defined purpose – the welfare of beneficiaries. In this paper, I look at the internal governance of pension funds emphasizing codes of practice, the rules and procedures for decision making, and trustee competence and expertise. While it is important to observe codes of conduct like those advocated by the OECD, there may be significant problems with any system of governance that relies upon rules and procedures. Inertia rather than innovation may be the net result. These issues are developed with reference to defined benefit and defined contribution schemes (and their variants). Ultimately, pension fund governance reflects, more often than not, its nineteenth-century antecedents rather than the financial imperatives of the twenty-first century.

Why Pairing LDI with De-Risking Glide Paths Produces Inferior Pension Fund Outcomes

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Pension Fund ◽  
Pension Plan ◽  
Pension Funds ◽  
Conventional Wisdom ◽  
Alternative Solution ◽  
Credit Risks ◽  
Glide Path ◽  
Funded Status ◽  
Illiquid Assets ◽  
Glide Paths

Combining traditional Liability Driven Investment (LDI) with funded status responsive de-risking strategies involves inconsistent treatment of risks in these two elements of what has become a popular pension strategy. This inconsistency causes irreconcilable conflicts in their execution and imperils the positive pension fund outcome. This article provides a critique of the combined LDI/De-risking Glide Path strategy as currently implemented by many pension plan managers and also provides an example of an alternative solution that improves pension plan outcomes. Our prescription for the pension de-risking glide path approach differs from conventional wisdom, resulting in faster de-risking, without undesirable market betas that are unrelated to the liability. It also avoids illiquid assets that pension funds often gravitate toward in their quest for returns, takes fewer credit risks, and seeks more alpha risks.

scholarly journals Sharing risk: the Netherlands' new approach to pensions

2008 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 91-105 ◽  
Author(s):  
EDUARD H. M. PONDS ◽  
BART VAN RIEL
Keyword(s):  
Risk Management ◽  
Risk Sharing ◽  
Pension Plan ◽  
Pension Funds ◽  
Contingent Claim ◽  
Average Wage ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Hybrid Combination ◽  
Intergenerational Risk ◽  
Intergenerational Risk Sharing

AbstractThe solvency crisis in 2001–2004 urged Dutch pension funds to reconsider their final-pay plans with de facto unconditional indexation. Most pension funds switched to an average-wage plan with solvency-contingent indexation. This pension plan redesign was the outcome of a new compromise between the major stakeholders of Dutch pension funds. The redesign is of interest as it results in a hybrid combination of DB and DC. This new setting indeed greatly improves solvency risk management. Moreover, the new plan structure appears to be welfare-dominant compared to other collective plan settings and individual alternatives, as it improves the conditions for intergenerational risk sharing. However, drawbacks of the new plans are the lack of transparency and potential welfare loss for individuals because of the inherent contingent claim structure of the new plan. Moreover, the plan redesign has led to value redistribution from older to younger plan participants.

Operating costs of pension funds: the impact of scale, governance, and plan design

2007 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
JACOB A. BIKKER ◽  
JAN DE DREU
Keyword(s):  
Economies Of Scale ◽  
Pension Plan ◽  
Pension Funds ◽  
Operating Costs ◽  
Defined Benefit ◽  
Defined Contribution ◽  
Defined Benefit Plans ◽  
Plan Design ◽  
Using Data ◽  
The Impact

AbstractAdministrative and investment costs per participant appear to vary widely across pension funds. These costs are important because they reduce the rate of return on the investments of pension funds and consequently raise the cost of retirement security. This article examines the impact of determinants of these costs, such as the size, governance, pension plan design and outsourcing decisions, using data on all Dutch pension funds across the 1992–2004 period, including more than 10,000 observations. We find that economies of scale dominate the strong dispersion in both administrative and investment costs across pension funds. Industry-wide pension funds are significantly more efficient than company funds and other funds. The operating costs of pension funds' defined contribution plans are lower than those of defined benefit plans. Higher shares of pensioners make funds more costly, whereas the reverse is true when relatively many participants are inactive.

scholarly journals Pension fund finance and sponsoring companies

2012 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 439-463 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. PHILIP DAVIS ◽  
LEO DE HAAN
Keyword(s):  
Capital Market ◽  
Small Firms ◽  
Pension Fund ◽  
Pension Funds ◽  
Portfolio Allocation ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Defined Benefit ◽  
Defined Contribution ◽  
Capital Market Imperfections ◽  
Corporate Pension

AbstractWe present empirical evidence on the funding and portfolio allocation of around 200 Dutch corporate pension funds over the period 1996-2005, with a special focus on the influence of the sponsoring firm. We find that unprofitable and small firms contribute less to their pension funds than profitable and large firms, consistent with theories of capital market imperfections. Sponsor contributions are found to be positively correlated with leverage, suggesting that tax effects play a role. Defined benefit funds invest relatively more in equity and less in bonds than their defined contribution counterparts, which is in accordance with the risk shifting theory.

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