As a quarter of multinational company pension funds are reported as considering how they can establish European cross border pension funds, the Pan European Pensions Task Force of the Irish Government is hosting the Pan European Pensions Summit 2007 to examine how they can do so on October 16th in the Royal Hospital Kilmainham, Dublin.
The conference aims to examine all aspects of the establishment of cross- border pension funds. Leading specialists will explore the benefits of asset pooling, risk pooling and other strategies to achieve higher risk-free returns for European pension funds.
Ireland is one of the foremost jurisdictions for the domicilation and administration of cross border pension funds, following the launch of Ireland's innovative CCF pooling structure for pension funds in 2003 *.
Speaking at the conference launch, Ken O’Brien, Managing Director, Fintel Publications and producers of the conference said:
“This one day Summit will deliver a thorough framework for assessing the best cross-border fund strategies including a series of practical insights into the key issues from a corporate pension scheme and plan sponsor’s perspective”.
Pat Wall, Partner, PwC and Chairperson of the Pan-European Pensions Task Force added:
“The Summit takes place against a widespread consensus that assets in pension funds must grow substantially and pension funds must become more efficient. There are huge opportunities through the centralisation of pension administration and pooling of pension fund assets on a Pan-European basis. The conference aims to address the challenges and practicalities of how a true EU single market for pension provision can be established and resultant benefits and opportunities”.
The conference will be addressed by Dermot McCarthy, Secretary General, Department of An Taoiseach and will be chaired by Jaap Maasen, CEO, ABP, one of the world’s largest pension funds and Chairman, European Federation for Retirement Provision and Pat Wall, Partner, PwC and Chairperson of the Pan-European Pensions Task Force of the Irish Government.
Key features of the conference will include:
- Cutting edge discussion of the taxation and regulatory issues, featuring EU leading players including Peter Schonewille, DG, EU Taxation & Customs Union; Tony Hobman, CEIOPS spokesman and CEO of the UK Pensions Regulator; and Erich Eggenhoffer of the insurance & Pensions Unit of the European Commission;
- A detailed product discussion of the asset pooling agenda, featuring the various national products, including the CCF, the FCP, DGR, PFPV as well as structures designed to incorporate any or some of them;
- A series of state of the art presentations on best corporate governance issues for pension funds.
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_contractual_fund
According to the firm, which surveyed 323 large companies in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and the UK, of the 50 cross-border schemes already in place in Europe, 10 have so far been introduced since the launch of the EU Directive for pan-European retirement provision.
“Companies are beginning to consider that, instead of implementing a full and complicated pan-European pension fund, they could still gain from combining aspects, such as asset pooling, certain types of plans for some countries, or for certain groups of employees,” the researchers said. To register and for more details visit the conference website for more details on www.financedublin.com/conference or contact Fintel Publications on +353 1 293 0566.
