Former Morningstar Investment Management APAC chief investment officer Matt Wacher will join JANA as its new CIO as rival asset consultant Frontier Advisors prepares to bring its own outsourced CIO solution, powered by the former State Super investment team, to market.
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.
More than 1.5 million Australians aged 65 and over are sitting in accumulation phase, paying tax they don’t need to pay. The Actuaries Institute has a plan to fix that, and it doesn’t ask funds to do anything the government and regulators aren’t already pushing them to do.
The $170 billion fund has cut administration fees from 0.16 per cent to 0.08 per cent, following a platform migration completed in 2022 and a pension book that has roughly doubled in five years. Head of retirement income Darren Williams says that for now the fee is as low as it can go.
John Pearce, the chief investment officer of the $170 billion UniSuper, told Investment Magazine ‘s new podcast, the CIO Series, that demographic shifts mean Australia’s super funds are at “peak exposure” to illiquid assets, while the resurgence of the retail platforms could create near-term liquidity constraints.
Canada has established its first national-level sovereign wealth fund with a seed of C$25 billion to underwrite “nation-building” projects like ports, mines and energy infrastructure. In an unusual funding mechanism, the fund will issue a retail product that will allow individual investors to invest with the SWF and “participate in Canada’s growth”.
UniSuper chief investment officer John Pearce believes the traditional business cycle might be dead – and that investors need to reckon with what comes next. Speaking on the first episode of the inaugural season of the Investment Magazine CIO Series, Pearce argued that policymakers have created a regime of permanent stimulus, where any economic slowdown … Read more
TelstraSuper acting CIO Kate Misic has moved to HESTA as head of portfolio design as her old fund enters the final stages of its merger with Aware Super.
APRA-regulated super funds are managing more than $3 trillion in retirement savings that weren’t built for the speed at which material investment decisions now need to be made. Artificial intelligence offers a practical – and lawful – way to close the gap.
Industry veteran Richard Brandweiner has been appointed as the next chief investment officer of Australia’s sovereign wealth fund. Brandweiner, who has long argued that institutional capital has an obligation to shape the Australian economy, joins the Future Fund as it navigates an expanded mandate to invest in areas of national priority.
Diversa Trustees has applied to the government for a bailout of First Guardian investors worth approximately $239 million, arguing the losses were a result of fraud and it will be in the best financial interest to members.
The Conexus Institute executive director, Dr David Bell, and research fellow, Dr Geoff Warren, discuss key legislative reforms currently in the pipeline that need to be expedited by the government to support funds in their development of better outcomes for members.
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Investment Magazine provides in-depth, monthly analysis of trends and developments for all the businesses in which superannuation funds engage‚ including asset allocation, investment manager selection, custody and fund accounting, member administration, group insurance and compliance.
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