New mandatory pensions in Norway [NO]

epn has a concise summary of recent important developments in the Norwegian pensions market, which is characterised by the introduction of mandatory occupational pensions and the debate about moving to the prudent person rule in asset management. Remember that Norway, together with Iceland and Liechtenstein, is part of the European Economic Area which has committed to implementing the Pensions Directive into their own regulation.

Allianz goes pan-European

Allianz-CEO Diekmann reveals in an interview that Allianz is going to launch a "new pan-European pensions offer" later in the year (i.e. soon). He declines to give any details at this point, so it is not clear how this offering will be structured, but evidently demand from corporate customers has been sufficiently strong to warrant this development.

Of latency trading & algo-busters

This IBM report about algorithmic trading may not appear to be immediately relevant to any investor with a time horizon greater than a business day. But if you have fiduciary responsibility for best execution, it certainly helps to be aware of these developments.

EU Commission sues Italy [IT] [CZ] [HU] [PL]

Following action against the UK and Slovenia, the Commission has decided to refer Italy to the European Court of Justice for non-transposition of the Pensions Directive. Apparently Italy has also not responded to the Commission's reasoned opinion - why it has taken the Commission four months longer than in the case of the UK and Slovenia to discover that they had not received a response is not quite clear.

IPE adds, although it is unclear on what source this information is based, that the Commission has sent letters of formal notice to the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland. At any rate, the latter two countries have not been involved in infringement proceedings regarding the Pensions Directive to date, even though Poland definitely deserves attention as we noted earlier.

European Pensions from a Swiss perspective

The programme for the one day seminar on pan-European pensions from a Swiss perspective in Basle on 22 November 2006 is now available. Please register here, mentioning Tertium. Alternatively, you can download & send in a registration form.