Global Graying Report

Standard & Poor's has an interesting update of its Global Graying Report, which projects the current fiscal policy stance in conjunction with forecast demographic expenditures to arrive at hypothetical future ratings. It is a pity that Switzerland is missing from the simulations - France for instance goes from AAA today to Speculative in 2040.

2007 asset allocation survey

Mercer IC published its periodic asset allocation survey of European pension funds. Of the 651 funds surveyed, 75% still reside in the UK, thus the survey's cross country comparison may not be entirely reliable (via VF).

Cognitive dissonance in Germany

The cognitive dissonance refers to the results of the Fidelity REAL Index, a survey and comparison between effective and estimated retirement provisions in Germany. Whereas the Germans surveyed expect to achieve 70% of their final gross household income upon retirement, they will effectively only make 56%, which reveals a substantive gap between reality and expectations. Other interesting conclusions are available in the Executive Summary in English and the full brochure in German (both made available here with Fidelity's permission).

Similar surveys are currently being conducted in the UK and France. Watch this space.

Commission takes action

The EU Commission has issued a reasoned opinion against Belgium, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Italy, Lithuania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and the United Kingdom for non- or partial transposition of the Pensions Directive into their national law, thereby capturing all the member states that it has identified earlier for lagging. The next step in the infringement proceedings according to Art. 226 EU Treaty would be court action in front of the ECJ after two months time (via IPE).