It wasn't long ago that pretty much every in-house pension
team you could think of was either moving to outside consultants or at least
going as far as a tender for the business. And that included a number of in-house
investment teams being disbanded.
As highlighted in Pensions Week, it looks like the pendulum
may be swinging the other way again. Tesco and British Coal have both moved
back to in-house investment teams, and in Tesco’s case, they went further in
choosing to ignore the contradictory advice of their consultants.
Admittedly, with Tesco and British Coal, we are talking
about two of the biggest pension funds in the country, but I predict more will
follow their lead, for two reasons. Firstly, the blurring of investment advice
with investment management. Consultants in some cases are trying to have their
cake and eat it. And it’s pretty obvious that’s what they are doing.
Secondly, systems are far more superior nowadays. Even over
the last five years, the sophistication of the IT systems behind the trades and
the software used to measure and present investments have all improved exponentially.
It’s just easier to manage.
Look for the next lot of headlines. They won’t be far away.
No comments:
Post a Comment