The asset allocation decision is one of the most important decisions made by defined benefit pension schemes, with a major effect on the scheme contribution rate, funding ratio and financial position of the sponsoring company. We investigate the determinants of the equity allocation of UK pension funds using a panel of 1,304 observations on 125 companies that were members of the FTSE 100 over the 2003-2019 period. We find that seven variables have a significant effect on the allocation between equities and bonds -maturity (as measured by the effective duration of scheme liabilities), default risk, leverage of the sponsor, size of the sponsor (or the scheme), whether the scheme is closed to future contributions, whether the scheme has significant overseas liabilities, and a time trend. Our sensitivity analysis finds that the biggest effects on the asset allocation come from scheme maturity, the scheme's funding ratio and a time trend.

Pillar 1B (individual accounts) of the Chinese basic pension fund (BPF) have suffered from substantial underfunding due to a series of challenges such as rising longevity, conservative investment policies, and the fragmentation of the pension system. Using an asset-liability model (ALM) we investigate the effects of the pre-2015 and post-2015 limits on asset allocations, as well as no limits. We also investigate the likely effect on investment performance of transferring the pillar 1B funds to the Council of National Social Security Fund (NSSF) and raising the retirement age to 65. We find that an ALM is superior to an assets-only analysis, removing the limits on investment in domestic assets (but not foreign assets) would be beneficial, as would transferring the assets to the NSSF, and raising the retirement age. Finally, the official notional rate on individual accounts should be set at a realistic level.

No abstract