United Kingdom

UK - The Department for Work and Pensions is to take action to stop firms using differences between defined contribution regulations to cut scheme costs when faced with auto-enrolment.

UK - Unite has issued details of the legal action it is taking against Ford over the pensions advice it gave to former employees.

UK - Friends Provident's Trevor Matthews is to step down as chief executive and hand over the reins to former Scottish Widows chief Andy Briggs.

GERMANY/UK - Germany has replaced the UK as the preferred location for investment in non-listed real estate funds, new research shows.

UK - Changes to defined benefit indexation have saved FTSE100 schemes more than £15bn($23.6bn), Towers Watson estimates.

UK - Regulatory focus on plugging scheme deficits quickly is "unhelpful" and could actually damage businesses and pension funds, Hymans Robertson warns.

UK - BlackRock head of defined contribution sales Emma Douglas has left the firm for Mercer where she will help launch and head up the consultant's corporate wrap offering.

UK/BELGIUM - The Upper Tribunal expressed "serious reservations" about the amount The Pensions Regulator is chasing in its contribution notice against Michel Van De Wiele NV.

UK - Pensions are seen as an "old fashioned" way to save for retirement compared with property, Aegon research finds.

UK - Introducing shared risk through a career average scheme for the public sector is the only way to achieve long-term sustainability and lasting reform, Mercer says.