Not All Liability Hedges Are Created Evenly: Guidance for US Plan Sponsors in Today’s Interest Rate Environment
In an era of historically low interest rates, heightened risk of yield curve steepening complicates pension risk management.
Authored by: Alex Pekker
Navigating Market Crises: Insights and Recommendations from US Plan Sponsors
With the initial chaos of the COVID-19 pandemic somewhat behind us but much uncertainty and potential volatility ahead, plan sponsors will be well served by focusing on—and possibly recalibrating—some core plan management elements. These approaches include liquidity management, rebalancing processes and opportunities, governance, and communication.
Credit Spreads Take Pensions for a Wild Ride
As the COVID-19 outbreak has escalated in the United States, sponsors of single employer–defined benefit pension plans have experienced a roller coaster ride. Avoiding, or at least cushioning, another wild ride requires a well-designed hedging strategy that accounts for credit spreads. We provide context for this rapidly evolving spread environment and potential responses.
Structuring Healthcare System Investments for Success
Healthcare systems can benefit greatly by maximizing equity orientation and illiquidity while prudently managing risk. But a typical healthcare system may have investment assets in multiple accounts, due to mergers & acquisitions, capital projects, and fundraising, as well as operational and pension benefit growth. Investments can be curated—identified, categorized, and clustered—for optimal efficiency and cost savings. Similarly, defined benefit pension plans can be restructured to better manage pension risk and administration. This paper discusses strategies to simplify and streamline investment structures to make complexity more manageable for investment and financial executives.
Revving UK Pension Schemes’ Funding Engines
A number of UK defined benefit pension schemes have experienced significant funding level gains in recent years, driven by sponsor contributions, liability management exercises, and strong equity market returns. However, due to increased volatility in global equity markets, relatively high valuations in many market segments, and the late stages of the economic and credit cycles, optimising the scheme’s growth engine is more challenging than ever. This paper provides a framework for how to achieve that goal.
Revving Pension Plans’ Funding Engines
Many corporate defined benefit plans experienced significant funded status gains in recent years. Recent capital markets volatility, however, has set many plans a few steps back, re-focusing plan sponsors on both protecting long-term funded status gains and closing the asset-liability deficit. Given increased volatility in global equity markets, relatively high valuations in many market segments, and the late stages of the economic and credit cycles, optimizing the plan’s growth engine is more critical, and challenging, than ever. This publication provides a framework for how to do so in the context of the evolving market environment.
Should Fixed Income Derivatives Play a Role in Liability Hedging for Pension Plans?
Yes. Since fixed income derivatives are more capital efficient and flexible than physical bonds, they can play a key role in liability hedging for many corporate and other single-employer pension plans.
Liability-Hedging Handbook: A Guide to Best Practices for US Pension Plans
For many pension plans, investment strategy is often structured with a liability-hedging portfolio and a growth portfolio, with the weight and composition of each determined by a strategic asset allocation or a de-risking glidepath. Within this overall structure, the construction and calibration of the liability-hedging portfolio is integral to effective pension asset management. This report focuses exclusively on the liability-hedging portfolio, delineating key considerations and best practices for single-employer defined benefit plans including those sponsored by corporations, health care institutions, non-profit organizations, and certain partnerships.
A Balancing Act: Strategies for Financial Executives in Managing Pension Risk
As pressures on pensions mount, we believe financial executives are best served by re-evaluating major decisions in terms of the true tools at their disposal. In this paper we review four levers that are fundamental drivers of pension costs and outcomes: asset returns, liability hedging, contribution policy, and benefit management. Balancing these levers is critical to enabling greater probability of success in managing pension risk, and we introduce a framework for chief financial officers and other financial executives to use in doing so.
Playing the Long Game—Should the US Treasury Issue Ultra-Long Bonds?
Yes. Issuance of ultra-long Treasury bonds (greater than 30 years to maturity, including potentially 40-, 50-, and 100-year maturities) would benefit multiple constituents.