Asset Allocation

The £16bn Barclays UK Pension Fund has added to its in-house investment team with the appointment of Stergios Saloustros as head of dynamic asset allocation.

Babcock International has appointed Northern Trust to provide £2bn in global custody, transition management, investment accounting and performance measurement services for the group's pension fund assets.

Balanced pooled funds ended their run of positive quarters with a negative return of -8.9% for Q2 of this year, statistics show.

Japan - Japan's $1.35trn public pension fund could split its asset management in two, creating separate pools of safe assets and those offering higher returns, a government panel has said.

John Dickson of Hymans Robertson explains how schemes can take advantage of medium-term anomalies in order to boost returns

Schemes still favour equities despite market volatility, a J.P. Morgan Asset Management survey reveals.

IRELAND - Irish pension funds continued to deliver a positive performance for the sixth month in a row, returning 2.8% on average through August, Rubicon Investment Consulting research reveals.

GLOBAL - Pension schemes are still eyeing opportunistic investments despite the severity of the current crisis, asset managers say.

GLOBAL - Net outflows from long-term investment funds worldwide slowed to €5bn (US$7.1bn) in the first quarter of 2009 after an average outflow of €211bn per quarter in the second half of 2008, data by the European Fund and Asset Management Association...

US - The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. has terminated the combined US$2.5bn mandates awarded to BlackRock, Goldman Sachs Asset Management and JPMorgan, but denies the move is a result of controversy surrounding the appointments.