Report
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April, 2019
Northern LGPS hits out at proposed rule change
Northern LGPS (formerly Northern Pool), the £45 billion asset pool set up by the Merseyside, Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire pension funds, has protested at a proposed rule change from central government, which it said could add tens of millions of pounds to asset pool running costs. Northern LGPS has written to government ministers to say it is ...
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April, 2019
Private equity investing in Europe hits £70 billion
Private equity investment in European companies reached a record level of Euro 81 billion (£70 billion) in 2018, up 7% on the previous year, according to Invest Europe, the representative body for European private equity firms. Private equity funds invested in over 7,800 companies, with nearly 90% of this in small and medium-sized enterprises. ...
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April, 2019
Chinese growth for Q1 exceeds expectations
The Chinese economy grew by more than market expectations in the first quarter of 2019, with a rise in gross domestic product (GDP) of 6.4% on a year-on-year basis, ahead of forecast growth of 6.3%. Schroders emerging markets economist Craig Botham said the results were something of surprise to China observers. “Given the weakness in high frequency data ...
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April, 2019
LGPS Central features in climate change initiative
LGPS Central, the asset pool for nine Midlands-based asset managers with combined assets of around £40 billion, has joined an initiative which will look at how investors can align their portfolios to the goals of the Paris Agreement on global warming action. The initiative, launched by the Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change (IIGCC), aims to ...
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April, 2019
Unison and ShareAction call for action on ESG disclosures from the LGPS
Responsible investment charity ShareAction and trade union Unison have produced a report looking at the investment strategy statements of the 88 funds in the LGPS. The report, Responsible Investment in the LGPS, published in April 2019, found that many funds have either not produced policy on environmental, social and governance (ESG) policies, or were ...
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April, 2019
London ranks second in global city index despite Brexit
London has been ranked second in the Schroders Global Cities 30 index, despite the political and economic uncertainty created by Britain’s prolonged Brexit crisis. Los Angeles retains the top spot in the index, which takes into account factors such as projected economic growth, disposable incomes in the next decade and population size. Hong Kong, New ...
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April, 2019
Emerging market outperformance to widen
Emerging market growth in set to grow in relation to developed markets, as growth in the USA and Europe slows down, while China and other emerging markets recover. NN Investment Partners said that the difference in annual GDP growth between emerging and developed markets rose from 2.3% in 2015 to 2.9% in 2018. It said that China’s domestic demand should ...
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April, 2019
PiP acquires onshore wind farm assets
The Pensions Infrastructure Platform (PiP), developed by UK pension funds to boost their access to infrastructure assets, has bought a portfolio of onshore wind farms from Scottish Enterprise Partners (SEP) for £50 million. The portfolio of wind farms consists of 64 turbines located across the UK and Ireland, including five wind farm investments made by ...
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April, 2019
PLSA set out its priorities for the next four years
The Policy Board of the UK trade body for pension funds, the Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association (PLSA), has agreed on a four-year plan to help everyone achieve better retirement incomes. The PLSA has identified four key themes for 2019 to 2022; achieving well-run pension funds, encouraging effective engagement, supporting adequate contributions and ...
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April, 2019
Timing momentum with Automated Intelligence pays off
A fund manager has claimed that the momentum factor behind share price movements can be enhanced by the use of systematic timing. Fund manager NN Investment Partners (NN IP) said it has found a strong momentum factor in market returns across a range of asset classes, including equities, currency and commodities, but with occasional crashes and bouts of ...
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