Die Kontrolle der Geschäftsleiter von Versicherungsunternehmen

The law of state supervision of insurance companies stipulates a fit and proper test for directors of insurance undertakings, insurance holding companies, mixed financial holding companies, pension scheme, pension funds and loss assessors. The article addresses the questions how the fit and proper test should be applied and what kind of problems will come up in practical cases.     

Capital market pressure,real earnings management,and institutional ownership stability - Evidence from Poland

This study investigates whether and how institutional ownership stability influences real earnings management. We find that institutional investors holding stable equity stakes play an important monitoring role in reducing real earnings management by managers pressured by capital market forces to “meet or beat” earnings targets. We also document no relationship between institutional ownership stability and real earnings management in companies with entrenched managers protected from capital market pressure by a dual-class ownership structure. Our findings of the negative association between real earnings management and institutional ownership stability also indicate that firms with more stable ownership are engaged in lesser sales manipulation and overproduction. In addition, we reveal that pressureresistant institutions (pension funds and mutual funds) that reduce real earnings management are an essential part of the external governance mechanism in an emerging economy.     

Institutional investor stability and crash risk: Monitoring versus short-termism?

This study tests two opposing views of institutional investors—monitoring versus short-termism. We present evidence that institutional investor stability is negatively associated with 1-year-ahead stock price crash risk, consistent with the monitoring theory of institutional investors but not the short-termism theory. Our findings are shown to be robust to alternative empirical specifications, estimation methods and endogeneity concerns. In addition, we find that institutional ownership by public pension funds (bank trusts, investment companies, and independent investment advisors) is significantly negatively (positively) associated with future crash risk, consistent with findings that pension funds more actively monitor management than other types of institutions.     

Institutional investment and the changing role of public equity markets: International evidence

Using country-level data, we study the relation between institutionalization of capital and various measures of reliance on public equity markets. For developed and developing countries, assets under institutional management (mutual funds, pension funds, and insurance companies) are negatively related to the number of listed companies, market capitalization, and trading volume. The negative relationships are estimated on the margin, as other factors such as GDP have countervailing positive partial effects and are generally stronger for more highly developed countries. Results indicate that as direct ownership of equity by retail investors is displaced by investing through institutions, financial systems become less public-market-centric.     

HOW SHOULD PENSION FUNDS MANAGE RISK?

Despite recent advances in risk management techniques, pension funds are still struggling with the concept of risk and with the practical challenges of managing and measuring it in useful ways. This article addresses this problem by showing that pension fund managers must manage two types of risk that affect a pension fund balance sheet's funded ratio. The most important of the two is asset policy risk, which arises from the choice of an asset mix policy that does not match the accrued pension liabilities. The other risk results from the decision to implement the chosen asset mix using active rather than passive management strategies.
This article shows how both types of risk can be measured and managed through an adapted value at risk (VAR) metric: the funded ratio VAR. A study of the performance of 98 pension funds during the period 1992–1995 shows that the funds were adequately compensated, on average, for taking on the policy risk, but not for implementation risk.     

Pension Funds and Emerging Markets

This paper focuses on the investment behavior of pension funds in developed and emerging market countries. First, it analyzes the main determinants of the emerging market asset allocation of pension funds in developed countries. Second, it assesses how pension funds in emerging markets have contributed to the development of local securities markets. Third, it analyzes the determinants of pension funds' investment performance. The paper concludes with a discussion of why the emerging market asset allocation of pension funds in developed countries is likely to increase and what the challenges faced by pension funds in emerging markets are.     

New Evidence of the Impact of Dividend Taxation and on the Identity of the Marginal Investor

This paper examines the impact of a major change in dividend taxation introduced in the United Kingdom in July 1997. The reform was structured in such a way that the immediate impact fell almost entirely on the largest investor class in the United Kingdom, namely pension funds. We find significant changes in the valuation of dividend income after the reform, in particular for high-yielding companies. These results provide strong support for the hypothesis that taxation affects the valuation of companies, and that pension funds were the effective marginal investors for high-yielding companies.     

Efficiency evaluation of the Portuguese pension funds management companies

This paper ranks the pension funds management companies according to their change in total productivity for the period 1994–2007. We estimate the change in total productivity, breaking this down into technically efficient change and technological change by means of data envelopment analysis (DEA-Malmquist index). The aim of this procedure is to seek out those best practices that will lead to improved performance in the market. The implications arising from the study are considered in terms of managerial policy.     

Discretion in accounting for pensions under IAS 19: using the ‘magic telescope’?

We use a panel data set of UK-listed companies over the period 2005–2009 to analyse the actuarial assumptions used to value pension plan liabilities under IAS 19. The valuation process requires companies to make assumptions about financial and demographic variables, notably discount rate, price inflation, salary inflation and mortality/life expectancy of plan members/beneficiaries. We use regression analysis to analyse the relationships between these key assumptions (except mortality, where disclosures are limited) and company-specific factors such as the pension plan funding position and duration of pension liabilities. We find evidence of selective ‘management’ of the three assumptions investigated, although the nature of this appears to differ from the findings of US authors. We conclude that IAS 19 does not prevent the use of managerial discretion, particularly by companies whose pension plan funding positions are weak, thereby reducing the representational faithfulness of the reported pension figures. We also highlight that the degree of discretion used reflects the extent to which IAS 19 defines how the assumptions are to be determined. We therefore suggest that companies should be encouraged to justify more explicitly their choice of assumptions.     

The Global Asset Management Industry: Competitive Structure and Performance

The asset management industry represents one of the most dynamic parts of the global financial services sector. Funds under institutional management are massive and growing rapidly, particularly as part of the resolution of pension pressures in various parts of the world. The industry is not, however, well understood from the perspective of industrial organization and international competition, which is the focus of this paper. It begins with a schematic of asset management in a national and global flow-of-funds context, identifying the types of asset‐management functions that are performed and how they are linked into the financial system. It then assesses in some detail the three principal sectors of the asset management industry—mutual funds, pension funds, and private-client assets, as well as foundations, endowments, central bank reserves and other large financial pools requiring institutional asset management services. Relevant comparisons are drawn between the United States, Europe, Japan and selected emerging-market countries. This is followed by a discussion of the competitive structure, conduct and performance of the asset management industry, and its impact on global capital markets.     

Financial institutions’ business models and the global transmission of monetary policy

Global financial institutions play an important role in channeling funds across countries and, therefore, transmitting monetary policy from one country to another. In this paper, we study whether such international transmission depends on financial institutions’ business models. In particular, we use Dutch, Spanish, and U.S. confidential supervisory data to test whether the transmission operates differently through banks, insurance companies, and pension funds. We find marked heterogeneity in the transmission of monetary policy across the three types of institutions, across the three banking systems, and across banks within each banking system. While insurance companies and pension funds do not transmit home-country monetary policy internationally, banks do, with the direction and strength of the transmission determined by their business models and balance sheet characteristics.     

Pension Accounting: How Large Australian Companies are 'Paying Up' for Superannuation

In Australia accounting requirements for companies to report on superannuation fund costs substantially lag those overseas and are unsettled. Superannuation commitments for defined-benefit funds are required to be disclosed by sponsoring employers, although corporations are not required to disclose interests in defined-contribution funds. This paper documents the extent of companies' annual report disclosures of interests in defined-benefit superannuation funds. The paper also reviews the debate on pension accounting overseas and examines the impact of AASB 1028 on the reporting practices of sponsoring firms.     

论养老基金平衡机制--基于辽宁试点模式对养老基金平衡的透视

我国处于转轨中的养老模式面临着人口老龄化和转轨成本的双重压力，为此，2001年7月开始在辽宁省进行社保改革试点。本将以试点模式为研究起点，并将养老基金平衡剖析为两个收支平衡：一是横向平衡，二是纵向平衡。就横向平衡而言，笔认为难关的突破在于强化政府的社会保险责任，而纵向平衡的难关在于基金收益率。为此，本提出一些拓展性的社保改革思路，并认为在此基础之上养老基金的平衡是可以实现的。     

Pension roulette: have you bet too much on equities?

In the 1990s, funding pension obligations by investing in stocks looked smart. By 1999, the bull market had poured a collective $260 billion surplus into the pension coffers of the S&P 500, permitting the companies to record the year-to-year increases as additional income. But just two years later, the bear market had obliterated those gains, replacing them with a cavernous $240 billion deficit--which had to be offset by the unlucky firms' ongoing cash flows, wreaking havoc on their earnings, debt levels, and stock prices. Corporate executives may be blamed for this debacle. But they were only following the rules. Current accounting guidelines keep companies from recording pension liabilities and assets on their balance sheets, instead relegating them to the footnotes. That makes it hard to see the risk that market drops expose companies to. Board members and top executives need to look beyond distorted accounting numbers to the economic realities of pension plans. Once they do, they may be surprised to find that they would gain far greater value and flexibility by passively investing their pension funds entirely in bonds. A bond portfolio can be designed to meet precisely, and with virtual certainty, a company's pension obligation, thus eliminating the chance of a funding gap. The predictability of bond investments also stabilizes earnings and cash flow. The expanded corporate debt capacity that results can then be used to fuel growth or reduce the firm's overall cost of capital. Even without an overhaul of today's misguided accounting rules, there's little reason for companies' pension funds to hold anything other than bonds.     

Conflict of interest and proxy voting by institutional investors

Political pressures can bias public pension funds (PPFs) toward activist shareholders. The pension business ties mutual fund families (MFFs) have with portfolio firms can bias them toward firm management. We examine how these contrasting conflicts of interest affect institutional investors' proxy voting behavior and show PPFs (MFFs) are considerably more supportive of activist shareholders (firm management) in voting, even if doing so may harm investment value. The biases are more pronounced when incentive conflicts are stronger. PPFs support shareholder (management) proposals more (less) when Democrats gain more power in the fund's home state. Conflicted PPFs are particularly active in supporting value reducing shareholder proposals.     

Are investors compensated for their sophistication and informedness for company takeovers – An Australian study

I determine the sophistication and information level in takeovers for four investor classes which are individuals, nominees (fund managers), superannuation (pension) funds and incorporated companies. I also calculate their takeover returns. I find that the superannuation funds are informed and sophisticated; individuals are informed but unsophisticated; nominees are uninformed but sophisticated; and incorporated companies are uninformed and unsophisticated traders, and that the investors realise a return which is commensurate with their information and sophistication. This study improves on existing takeover return research which assumes, as a group, institutions are synonymously informed and sophisticated, and individuals are synonymously unsophisticated and uninformed.     

Bad company. The indirect effect of differences in corporate governance in the pension plan industry

This paper analyses the role played by pension plan governance structure and how it impacts on plan fees and plan performance. The results clearly show that fees decrease significantly and performance improves when pension plan governance structures permit full alignment of interests and allow greater capacity for the decision-makers to monitor and discipline the managers. It is also observed that companies managing both employee and individual funds, tend to exploit differences in the internal corporate governance mechanisms of each type of plan in order to nurture employer-sponsored plans at the expense of individual plans. These results suggest that internal corporate governance mechanisms allowing closer alignment with the interests of participants would be preferable to focusing exclusively on setting the minimum proportion of independent directors.     

Scale economies in pension fund investments: A dissection of investment costs across asset classes

Using a unique dataset of 225 Dutch occupational pension funds with a total of 928 billion euro of assets under management, we provide a comprehensive cross-sectional analysis of the relation between investment costs and pension fund size. Our dataset is free from self-reporting biases and decomposes investment costs for 6 asset classes in management costs and performance fees. We find that a pension fund that has 10 times more assets under management on average reports 7.67 basis points lower annual investment costs. Economies of scale differ per asset class. We find significant economies of scale in fixed income, equity and commodity portfolios, but not in real estate investments, private equity and hedge funds. We also find that large pension funds pay significantly higher performance fees for equity, private equity and hedge fund investments.     

The new joint pension scheme established by collective agreement between the Norwegian employers' confederation and the Norwegian federation of trade unions

Abstract

Norway has a statutory old age pension scheme covering the whole population over 70 years of age. Since 1959, pensions are granted without a means test. As from 1 April 1962, the annual pension amounts are 3348 crowns for a single person and 5028 crowns for a married couple. For special groups, such as seamen, fishermen and forestry workers, additional pension schemes have been established by law. Many private companies, especially the larger firms, have established staff pension schemes on a voluntary basis, either in the form of actuarial pension funds, or through collective pension insurance. Many of these schemes cover only staff employees, not workers. In other cases both groups are covered, but with relatively higher benefits for staff than for workers.     

养老金改革考验我们经济学的功底和智慧北大核心

本文从四个方面思考中国养老金改革问题。一是指出养老金改革是一个多维复杂的系统。宏观角度涉及养老金缺口问题和资本市场健康发展,微观角度与生产率密切相关。从国际比较来看,中国的老龄化程度比全球平均水平更严重,但养老金储备属于全球较低水平。从增强养老保障可持续性看,可能有延长退休年龄、增加储蓄、减少替代率、增加预筹资金并确保资金保值增值等四种办法。二是提出中国养老金改革的总体框架。本文建议建立一个较为综合的衡量目标,比如G30采用的"终身财务安全度量(Lifetime Financial Security,简称LFS)"的方法,跨部门比较政策效果,讨论维持在同一框架内,避免各说各话。本文还提出,中国养老金制度从DB型转向DC型,可以采取历史还原法和名义账户的办法,解决养老金改革转轨中的代际公平问题,以及城乡差别、所有制差别问题。三是提出"N对1"养老金发放模式与30余个养老金管理机构数量等养老金经营管理设想,并指出养老金投资回报与风险偏好须匹配,结合我国资本项目开放进程考虑养老金全球化投资。四是从住房、民粹主义等非金融领域,延伸思考养老金改革的复杂性。最后,本文总结指出,中国养老金改革是一项考验经济学功底和智慧的重大课题,应从多个维度全面分析、讨论、测算、论证,高度重视养老金改革对相关各方的激励作用,做出大胆有效的改革。