New Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services Daniel Mulino has a daunting task ahead of him, taking over from former minister Stephen Jones as the ‘super wars’ threaten to reignite and at a critical time in the reform of financial advice.
Asset owners that have set emission reduction targets face the onerous task of collecting and aggregating emissions data for every asset they own, and the challenge has been particularly complex for unlisted assets. Aware Super head of responsible investment Liza McDonald says working with the provider of the infrastructure that connects asset owners to asset managers and underlying assets has been “a brilliant step”.
Is an object still the same object if every original part has been replaced? It’s a philosophical question that Team Super chief executive officer Vasyl Nair mulls as he considers the future for a new $22 billion fund formed from the merger of Mine Super and TWUSUPER.
The $30 billion Vision Super has refuted claims that it will not work with financial advice firms that employ offshore staff, after a complaint raised by an adviser. The fund says it will only provide information to advice staff located within Australia, highlighting a vulnerability for advice firms using third-party support services based overseas.
The world’s largest asset manager has taken a minority stake in Generation Development Group and will partner with Generation Life to deliver a “turnkey” retirement solution for Australian super funds. But solving the “annuity puzzle” won’t be easy.
The end of a US-led world order won’t see China alone take its place but rather “a number of powers” will emerge, including Indonesia, according to defence expert Hugh White. The Emeritus Professor at the Australian National University has argued the nation will be among the four biggest economies by the middle of the century.
Members can be as big a risk to their own retirement savings as market volatility, but Aware Super has implemented a cross-fund approach to making sure they don’t crystallise losses at the bottom of the market. Still, key questions around retirement remain unsolved.
When Malaysia’s Employees Provident Fund (EPF) was established in 1951 the average retirement age in the country was 55 and life expectancy was 54. Today the retirement age remains the same, while the average life expectancy has increased 20 years. EPF chief executive officer Ahmad Zulqarnain Onn says managing accumulation is the “easy part”, while the real challenge lies with decumulation, and boosting voluntary contributions is key.
Aboriginal Investment NT has partnered with JANA to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in funds that will ultimately be used for nation-building investments. But it also wants to team up with other asset owners and managers to bring more impact to the Northern Territory.
Hostplus CEO David Elia said that the Labor Party’s return to power in last Saturday’s election is “incredibly positive” for the superannuation sector for the certainty it will provide around preservation. The fund also sees more opportunities to work with the government in energy transition and housing and lauded its plan to make Australia a major critical minerals supplier to the world.
The emphatic return of the Albanese Labor government to power should provide comfort to the superannuation sector, especially profit-to-member funds that had become a key target of the now depleted Dutton opposition. But they would be wise to avoid any complacency over the repudiation of right-wing populist approaches to super.
Labor will return to power with an expanded mandate and presence in the federal Parliament, but there are questions over its commitment to financial advice reform, following the retirement of Stephen Jones.
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