Investments
How AMP is using AI to hone its competitive edge
The big geopolitical and macroeconomic events of the last six years haven’t changed the investment game, according to AMP CIO Anna Shelley, but they have changed where you play it. The fund is also looking to its investment managers for AI innovations and examining the opportunities in the total portfolio approach.
2026 Fiduciary Investors Symposium NSW
‘It’s crazy’: More gold than bonds in AMP MySuper portfolios while funds rethink defensive plays
The shifting global economic landscape and its impact on currency markets are forcing asset owners to re-think the defensive portion of portfolios as traditional hedging techniques become less effective and new ones emerge. The Fiduciary Investors Symposium heard that for one fund that’s led to gold overtaking government bond allocations.
2026 Fiduciary Investors Symposium NSW
Fixed income returns to foundational role in real income revival
Fixed income investors are keeping a close eye on whether term premium on government bonds will increase further, as fiscal debt levels balloon across developed economies and questions mount around the demand and pricing of sovereign bonds.
Leadership & profiles
The ‘brutal pursuit’ that shaped Aware Super’s new CIO
The new chief investment officer of the $230 billion Aware Super expects that the fund will be around for the next 100 years. To make sure it keeps delivering for members, he’s optimising the work already done to build its portfolio, thinking hard about the best way to access assets, and embracing the risk management lessons he first learned as a trader for Chemical Bank.
21 July, 2026
Insurance in Super Summit
19 August, 2026
Retirement Leaders Summit
13 – 15 October, 2026
Fiduciary Investors Symposium
2026 Fiduciary Investors Symposium NSW
Why policymakers need to prepare for AI boom – and unrest
Economist and former RBA board member Warwick McKibbin told the Investment Magazine Fiduciary Investors Symposium that AI doomsayers aren’t grasping the economic opportunities it will create, but that policymakers still need to be prepared for social unrest arising from displacement of jobs by AI.
Leadership & profiles
GESB CEO calls time: ‘Past regime of default super’ no longer sustainable
GESB chief executive Ben Palmer is set to leave the Western Australian government super fund, ending a 13-year tenure after steering the fund through the most significant change in its history. In a rare interview, Palmer examines the past, present and future of super and explains why GESB is treating platforms, not profit-to-member funds, as its benchmark.
Profiles
Why HESTA’s ‘joined-up thinking’ is one of its CIO’s favourite things
Sonya Sawtell-Rickson joined HESTA as the health industry workers’ super fund was taking steps towards investment internalisation and a total portfolio approach. She says the moves have been vindicated not only by member returns but in the “joined-up” conversations the now-$96 billion fund has with the companies it invests in.
Retirement
CFS builds partnership alliance in retirement income push
Australia’s second-largest retail superannuation fund, the $136 billion Colonial First State, has pulled together a multi-partner model do deliver integrated retirement income solutions to members. CFS Superannuation chief executive officer Kelly Power tells Retirement Magazine the fund has responded primarily to the needs of members and demands of advisers, rather than directly to regulatory pressure arising from the Retirement Income Covenant.
Industry & regulation
Super complaints expected to reach 8000 in 2026: AFCA
Superannuation complaints to AFCA are on track to exceed 8000 this year, a second consecutive year of around 30 per cent increases. Heather Gray, who is retiring in May after six years as lead ombudsman for superannuation, told the authority’s Member Forum that the answer to reducing complaints lies in empowering funds’ IDR teams and communicating with complainants and AFCA early. The forum heard that handling unreasonable people is a critical skill.
Governance
Third HESTA exec heads for the door in less than 12 months
The departure of the $100 billion HESTA’s chief operating officer Stephen Reilly follows those of chief executive Debby Blakey and chief risk officer Andrew Major, and is part of a shake-up among the broader senior ranks of Australian super funds.
Industry & regulation
Treasury proposes sweeping YFYS changes to supercharge ’emerging asset classes’
Treasury is considering a new benchmark for “emerging assets” under proposed changes to the Your Future Your Super performance test meant to discourage the index-hugging behaviour that has characterised super fund investments since its introduction in 2021.
2026 Fiduciary Investors Symposium NSW
Suspensions and redemption queues ‘speed bumps’ on private credit road: Blue Owl
Asset owners are right to be concerned about private credit fund suspensions and redemption queues, Blue Owl head of alternative credit Ivan Zinn told the Investment Magazine Fiduciary Investors Symposium, but he thinks that two years from now they’ll be looked back on as nothing more than a “speed bump” on a highway of growth and strong returns.
Investments
Future Fund outruns Iran crisis, stagflation fears to return 11.7 per cent
Australia’s sovereign wealth fund has returned 11.7 per cent over the last 12 months, growing to a record $269.1 billion and shrugging off a turbulent March quarter shaped by the Iran conflict and stagflation fears.
