- ‘Twice as determined’: hundreds of thousands protest in Paris against pension changes – video report The Guardian
- French Unions Intensify Protests Against Macron Over Pension Reforms | France Protest 2023 News LIVE CNN-News18
- Hundreds more pension reform protests take place in France – BBC News BBC News
- EXPLAINED: Why Friday’s court ruling could prolong French pensions dispute for another 15 months The Local France
- There’s only one winner from Macron’s hardline response to pension protests: the far right The Guardian
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Tag Archives: pension
Weeks after his ‘big failure’ losing almost $2 billion on SVB, Sweden’s top pension fund chief sacked ‘with immediate effect’ – Fortune
- Weeks after his ‘big failure’ losing almost $2 billion on SVB, Sweden’s top pension fund chief sacked ‘with immediate effect’ Fortune
- Sweden’s Alecta Forces Out CEO After US Bank Losses Bloomberg Television
- Sweden’s top pension fund fires chief Magnus Billing after US bank losses Financial Times
- This pension fund was a top six shareholder in SVB, Signature and First Republic. Now it’s dismissed the CEO. MarketWatch
- Alecta CEO Steps Down as the Pension Fund Launches Strategic Review Institutional Investor
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Tourists frustrated as pension reform protesters block access to the Louvre – FRANCE 24 English
- Tourists frustrated as pension reform protesters block access to the Louvre FRANCE 24 English
- Members Of The Left Wing Union CGT Block The Entrance Of Louvre Museum | France Pension Protests CNN-News18
- Protests in France against Macron’s pension reforms escalate as police use 4,000 nonlethal dispersion grenades Fox News
- Meet the Rosies: The French women dancing against pension reform Euronews
- Violence escalates in French pension reform protests: “Social and political crisis” • FRANCE 24 FRANCE 24 English
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Macron to address government plan, protests after surviving no-confidence vote on pension reform – Fox Business
- Macron to address government plan, protests after surviving no-confidence vote on pension reform Fox Business
- French President Macron survives first vote of no confidence NBC News
- What We’re Watching: Slim win for Macron, protests in South Africa, Trump’s legal woes, Colombia peace collapsing? GZERO Media
- What can we expect from Macron’s live interview on the controversial pension reforms? The Local France
- REPLAY: French PM defends contested pension reform as ‘compromise’ • FRANCE 24 English FRANCE 24 English
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Macron’s pension plan advances despite strikes across France – The Associated Press – en Español
- Macron’s pension plan advances despite strikes across France The Associated Press – en Español
- French Protesters Pour Into Streets Ahead of Parliament Vote on Pension Overhaul The Wall Street Journal
- French protestors stage another round of strikes as committee of senators, lawmakers examine pension bill Fox News
- Macron’s controversial pension reform set for final votes despite nationwide protests FRANCE 24 English
- French Pension Strikes: The Party Is Ending for Retirees – WSJ The Wall Street Journal
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France hit by new wave of strikes against Macron’s pension reform
SAINT-NAZAIRE, France, Jan 31 (Reuters) – Striking workers disrupted French refinery deliveries, public transport and schools on Tuesday in a second day of nationwide protests over President Emmanuel Macron’s plan to make people work longer before retirement.
Crowds marched through cities across France to denounce a reform that raises the retirement age by two years to 64 and which is a test of Macron’s ability to push through change now that he has lost his working majority in parliament.
On the rail networks, only one in every three high-speed TGV trains were operating and even fewer local and regional trains. Services on the Paris metro were thrown into disarray.
Buoyed by their success earlier in the month when more than a million people took to the streets, trade unions which have been battling to maintain their power and influence urged the public to turnout en masse.
“We won’t drive until we’re 64!” bus driver Isabelle Texier said at a protest in Saint-Nazaire on the Atlantic coast, adding that many careers involved tough working conditions.
Others felt resigned ahead of likely bargaining between Macron’s ruling alliance and conservative opponents who are more open to pension reform than the left.
“There’s no point in going on strike. This bill will be adopted in any case,” said 34-year-old Matthieu Jacquot, who works in the luxury sector.
Unions said half of primary school teachers had walked off the job. TotalEnergies (TTEF.PA) said 55% of its workers on morning shifts at its refineries had downed tools, a lower number than on Jan. 19. The hard-left CGT union said the figure was inaccurate.
For unions, the challenge will be maintaining a strike movement at a time when high inflation is eroding salaries.
At a local level, some announced “Robin Hood” operations unauthorised by the government. In the southwestern Lot-et-Garonne area, the local CGT trade union branch cut power to several speed cameras and disabled smart power meters.
“When there is such a massive opposition, it would be dangerous for the government not to listen,” said Mylene Jacquot, secretary general of the CFDT union’s civil servants branch.
[1/16] Protesters attend a demonstration against French government’s pension reform plan in Paris as part of a day of national strike and protests in France, January 31, 2023. REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes
Opinion polls show a substantial majority of the French oppose the reform, but Macron intends to stand his ground. The reform was “vital” to ensure the viability of the pension system, he said on Monday.
A street march in Paris takes place later in the day.
‘BRUTAL’
The pension system reform would yield an additional 17.7 billion euros ($19.18 billion) in annual pension contributions, according to Labour Ministry estimates.
Unions say there are other ways to raise revenue, such as taxing the super rich or asking employers or well-off pensioners to contribute more.
“This reform is unfair and brutal,” said Luc Farre, the secretary general of the civil servants’ UNSA union. “Moving (the pension age) to 64 is going backwards, socially.”
French power supply was down by 4.5% or 3 gigawatts (GW), as workers at nuclear reactors and thermal plants joined the strike, data from utility group EDF (EDF.PA) showed.
TotalEnergies said deliveries of petroleum products from its French sites had been halted because of the strike, but that customers’ needs were met.
The government made some concessions while drafting the legislation. Macron had originally wanted the retirement age to be set at 65, while the government is also promising a minimum pension of 1,200 euros a month.
Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne has said the 64 threshold is “non-negotiable”, but the government is exploring ways to offset some of the impact, particularly on women.
Hard-left opposition figure Jean-Luc Melenchon, a vocal critic of the reform, said parliament would on Monday debate a motion calling for a referendum on the matter.
“The French are not stupid,” he said at a march in Marseille. “If this reform is vital, it should be possible to convince the people.”
Reporting by Forrest Crellin, Benjamin Mallet, Sudip Kar-Gupta, Leigh Thomas, Blandine Henault, Michel Rose, Dominique Vidalon, Benoit Van Overstraeten; Writing by Ingrid Melander and Richard Lough; Editing by Janet Lawrence
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Macron, unions head for French pension reform showdown
PARIS, Jan 10 (Reuters) – The French should work two years longer to age 64 before retiring, the government said on Tuesday, announcing an unpopular pension system overhaul that immediately prompted unions to call for strikes and protests.
The right to retire at a relatively young age is deeply cherished in France and the reform will be a major test of President Emmanuel Macron’s ability to deliver change as social discontent mounts over the cost of living.
The reform’s passage through parliament will not be easy. Macron’s government says it is vital to keep the pension budget out of the red. Unions argue the reform is unfair and unnecessary.
“Nothing justifies such a brutal reform,” Laurent Berger, leader of the moderate, reform-minded CFDT union, told reporters after trade union leaders agreed on a nationwide strike for Jan. 19, which will kick off a series of strikes and protests.
An Odoxa poll showed four out of five citizens oppose the higher retirement age.
“I’m well aware that changing our pension system raises questions and fears among the French,” Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne had told a news conference shortly before.
“We offer today a project to balance our pension system, a project that is fair,” she said, adding that France had to face reality.
Overhauling the pension system was a central pillar of Macron’s reformist agenda when he entered the Elysee Palace in 2017. But he shelved his first attempt in 2020 as the government battled to contain COVID-19.
The second attempt will not be any easier.
“It’s one slap in the face after another,” said 56-year-old Frederic Perdriel during a small protest in the western city of Rennes ahead of Borne’s announcement. “There are other ways to finance pensions than raising the retirement age.”
“BRUTAL, CRUEL”
Macron and Borne will need to win support among conservative Les Republicains (LR) lawmakers in the coming months to pass the reform in parliament.
That looks less challenging than it did a few weeks ago after concessions on the retirement age – Macron had originally wanted it to be 65 – and a minimum pension.
Olivier Marleix, who leads the LR group in the lower house of parliament, reacted positively to Borne’s announcements.
“They heard us,” he said, while asking for more efforts to ensure employment for people close to retirement age.
Even so, LR is divided on the issue, so every vote counts.
The Socialists, the hard-left La France Insoumise (France Unbowed) and the far-right’s National Rally were swift to denounce the reform. Left-wing lawmaker Mathilde Panot branded the plan “archaic, unfair, brutal, cruel.”
“The French can count on our determination to block this unfair reform,” the far-right’s Marine Le Pen said.
Under the government plan, the retirement age will be raised by three months per year from September, reaching the target age of 64 in 2030.
From 2027, eight years earlier than planned in past reforms, it will be necessary to have worked 43 years to receive a full pension.
Other measures aim to boost the employment rate among 60 to 64-year-olds, which is one of the lowest among leading industrialised nations.
With one of the lowest retirement ages in the industrialised world, France also spends more than most countries on pensions at nearly 14% of economic output, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Reporting by Elizabeth Pineau, Leigh Thomas, Stephane Mahe, Tassilo Hummel, Blandine Henault; writing by Ingrid Melander; editing by Richard Lough, Alexandra Hudson and Josie Kao
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Arizona divesting pension funds from BlackRock over ESG push
The founder of the crypto exchange FTX manipulated ESG to convince investors that everything was above board before filing for bankruptcy, investor says.
Arizona is forging ahead with its plan to divest its pension funds from BlackRock due to concerns over the massive investment firm’s push for environmental, social, and governance (ESG) policies that have led other states to take similar actions.
Arizona Treasurer Kimberly Yee said in a statement released Thursday that the state treasury’s Investment Risk Management Committee (IRMC) began to assess the relationship between the state’s pension fund and BlackRock in late 2021.
“Part of the review by IRMC involved reading the annual letters by CEO Larry Fink, which in recent years, began dictating to businesses in the United States to follow his personal political beliefs,” Yee wrote. “In short, BlackRock moved from a traditional asset manager to a political action committee. Our internal investment team believed this moved the firm away from its fiduciary duty in general as an asset manager.”
ESG FALLOUT: BLACKROCK CEO LARRY FINK SHOULD RESIGN, SAYS STATE TREASURER
BlackRock offices in New York City. The company, along with nine others, were named by Texas Comptroller Glenn Hegar as being hostile to the state’s fossil fuel sector. (Erik McGregor/LightRocket via Getty Images / Getty Images)
In response to those findings, Yee noted that Arizona began to divest over $543 million from BlackRock money market funds in February 2022 and “reduced our direct exposure to BlackRock by 97%” over the course of the year. Yee added that Arizona “will continue to reduce our remaining exposure in BlackRock over time in a phased in approach that takes into consideration safe and prudent investment strategy that protects the taxpayers.”
Although the state will continue to hold some BlackRock stock through shares in a passive index of the top 1,500 American corporations, Arizona will have “minimal direct exposure” to BlackRock amounting to “less than 1 tenth of one percent of our total assets under management” as of the end of November. Yee said that Arizona intends to vote its shares in the index in an effort to “change the political activism of BlackRock.”
“We will continue to fight back against the dangerous path of companies pushing their social issues and wokeism inside of the investment space and return to traditional money management that puts the people first,” Yee’s statement concluded.
BLACKROCK’S ESG PUSH PUTS CEO LARRY FINK IN ACTIVIST CROSSHAIRS
Larry Fink, Chairman and CEO of BlackRock, arrives at the DealBook Summit in New York City, Nov. 30, 2022. (Reuters/David ‘Dee’ Delgado)
BlackRock is currently the world’s largest asset manager with roughly $8 trillion under management and is one of several major financial institutions that have led the charge for the adoption of ESG standards in recent years. The ESG movement broadly seeks to promote a green energy transition and left-wing social priorities through the financial sector. Critics of the ESG movement argue that its focus on green investments runs contrary to the fiduciary responsibility of firms to pursue the best possible returns for investors.
BlackRock pushed back against criticisms of its investment strategy in a statement to Fox Business which read in part: “Over the past year, BlackRock has been subject to campaigns suggesting we are either ‘too progressive’ or ‘too conservative’ in how we manage our clients’ money. We are neither. We are a fiduciary. We put our clients’ interests first and deliver the investment choices and performance they need. We will not let these campaigns sway us from delivering for our clients.”
The statement added, “In the U.S. alone, clients awarded BlackRock $84 billion of long-term net inflows in the third quarter and $275 billion over the last twelve months.”
DESANTIS PRAISED FOR PULLING MONEY FROM BLACKROCK OVER ESG CONCERNS: ‘ILLEGAL LEFTIST SCAM’
Larry Fink, chief executive officer of BlackRock Inc., speaks during a Bloomberg Television interview in New York, U.S., on Wednesday, April 19, 2017. (Christopher Goodney/Bloomberg via Getty / Getty Images)
The ESG policies advanced by BlackRock have drawn the ire of some investors and state policymakers alike.
Florida’s chief financial officer announced recently that the state’s treasury is taking action to remove about $2 billion in assets from BlackRock’s stewardship before the end of this year. In October, Louisiana and Missouri announced they would reallocate state pension funds away from BlackRock, which amounted to roughly $1.3 billion in combined assets. Taken together with Arizona’s divestment, roughly $3.8 billion in state pension funds have been divested from BlackRock by those four states alone.
Additionally, North Carolina’s state treasurer has called for BlackRock CEO Larry Fink’s resignation and the Texas legislature has subpoenaed BlackRock for financial documents.
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The investment firm has also taken heat from activists who argue BlackRock isn’t doing enough to follow through with its ESG commitments. New York City Comptroller Brad Lander wrote to Fink in September citing an “alarming” contradiction between the company’s words and its deeds. Lander wrote, “BlackRock cannot simultaneously declare that climate risk is a systemic financial risk and argue that BlackRock has no role in mitigating the risks that climate change poses to its investments by supporting decarbonization in the real economy.”
BlackRock has insisted that its “role in the transition is as a fiduciary to our clients,” and “to help them navigate investment risks and opportunities, not to engineer a specific decarbonization outcome in the real economy.”
Fox Business’ Breck Dumas contributed to this story.
Bank of England Offers More Support for Pension Funds Amid Crisis
LONDON—The Bank of England expanded its support of pension funds at the heart of the U.K.’s bond-market crisis even as borrowing costs leapt higher, a sign that stress in the financial system wasn’t going away.
The U.K.’s central bank said Monday that it would increase the daily amounts it was willing to buy in long-dated bonds before ending the program as scheduled on Friday. It also unveiled two types of lending facilities aimed at freeing up cash for pension funds beyond the end of the bond buying.
The moves failed to calm markets, with yields on 30-year U.K. gilts, as government bonds are known, jumping to as high as 4.64%, from 4.39% on Friday. Outside the past two weeks such moves would be considered unusually large for a single day.
The Bank of England launched its initial foray into markets on Sept. 28 when it offered to buy up to £5 billion, or around $5.55 billion, a day of long-dated government bonds. The program was aimed at stanching the damage from a furious selloff in U.K. government debt over previous days in the aftermath of a surprise package of tax cuts announced by the government.
“The underlying message is that there’s been too little risk reduction so far,” said Antoine Bouvet, senior rates strategist at ING. “There’s a message to pension funds and potential sellers that the window is closing and they need to hurry up.”
He attributed Monday’s bond selloff to disappointment among investors who had expected the BOE to extend the bond-buying facility.
The original intervention in late September at first calmed markets, with government bond yields plunging in response. But yields shot back up in recent days after it appeared the bank was buying far less than the £5 billion a day, a possible sign that the program wasn’t working as intended.
In the history of crisis interventions, central banks often have to make multiple stabs at solving problems with different types of bond buying or lending programs before markets become convinced that a viable backstop has been created. During the Covid-19 meltdown in March 2020, the Federal Reserve expanded its lending programs several times before calm was restored.
The BOE said it would increase the daily amount of purchases on offer until the program ends, starting with £10 billion Monday, though it was unclear if there would be take-up by distressed sellers.
The lending programs announced Monday included what the BOE called a temporary expanded collateral repo facility. This lends cash to pension funds in exchange for an expanded menu of collateral than was previously available to the pension plans, including index-linked gilts, whose returns are tied to inflation, and corporate bonds.
The operations would be processed through banks working on behalf of the pension funds. The BOE also made an existing, permanent repo lending facility available to banks acting to help pension-fund clients.
The crisis centers on a corner of the market known as LDIs, or liability-driven investments. LDIs became popular in recent years among U.K. defined-benefit pension plans to make enough money in the long term to match what they owed retirees. These strategies use financial derivatives tied to interest rates.
LDIs also contain leverage, or borrowing, that amplifies pension-fund investments by as much as six or seven times. When the long-dated U.K. government bond yield that undergird LDI investments surged more than they ever have in a single day at the end of September, LDI fund managers required pension funds to post massive amounts of fresh collateral to back up the investments.
To generate that collateral, pension funds have been selling non-LDI bonds, stocks and other investments.
In a letter to lawmakers last week, BOE Deputy Gov.
Jon Cunliffe
said the bank acted to stop forced selling by LDI investors and a “self-reinforcing spiral of price falls.”
The point of the new lending programs and the bond buying is to make it easier for the pension funds to drum up cash so they can pay down the leverage on their LDI funds without causing wider market disruption.
“The Bank of England has been listening to schemes and the challenges they’re facing right now in still struggling to access liquidity quickly enough to recapitalize LDI,” said Ben Gold, head of investment at
XPS Pensions Group,
a U.K. pensions consultant. The measures also help funds avoid having to sell assets at poor prices, he said.
Mr. Gold estimates that it is going to take between £100 billion and £150 billion for the industry to shore up its collateral on LDI funds.
“I would estimate that we’re probably about halfway there,” he said. “There is still a lot of activity that’s needed to get it done before 14th October.”
Soaring inflation and expectations of swelling government bond issuance pushed bond yields up sharply in recent months. Investors in U.K. government bonds were troubled by the tax cuts announced by Prime Minister
Liz Truss’s
government in part because they weren’t accompanied by a customary analysis of the impact on borrowing by the independent budget watchdog.
U.K. Treasury chief
Kwasi Kwarteng
on Monday said he would announce further budgetary measures on Oct. 31 that will be accompanied by forecasts from the Office for Budget Responsibility, which provides independent analysis of government spending. He previously said that wouldn’t happen until Nov. 23.
—Caitlin Ostroff contributed to this article.
Write to Paul Hannon at paul.hannon@wsj.com, Chelsey Dulaney at Chelsey.Dulaney@wsj.com and Julie Steinberg at julie.steinberg@wsj.com
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Biden’s union pension bailout: What it means, and will it work?
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The Biden administration unveiled details this week of the final rules surrounding the federal bailout of hundreds of union pension plans passed as part of Democrats’ $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act coronavirus relief package last year, saying it will secure workers’ benefits for decades to come.
ARPA’s Special Financial Assistance Program injects $90 billion of taxpayer funds into the federal government’s Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, which insures private-sector pensions. Prior to the passage of the purported COVID package, the PBGC was set to become insolvent in 2026.
The White House claims the plan will prevent 2 to 3 million workers from having their pension payments cut in retirement, by saving upwards of 200 private-sector union plans that had been in danger of insolvency.
US President Joe Biden speaks about the economy and the final rule implementing the American Rescue Plans Special Financial Assistance program, protecting multiemployer pension plans, at Max S. Hayes High School in Cleveland, Ohio, July 6, 2022. (Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images / Getty Images)
President Biden touted the accomplishment during a speech in Ohio on Wednesday, saying that retirees in the shaky plans who have already seen cuts in benefits “will have them restored retroactively,” and that he “turned a promise broken into a promise kept.”
BIDEN PROVES HIMSELF TOXIC TO DEMOCRATS DURING OHIO TRIP, JIM JORDAN SAYS: ‘WHERE’S TIM RYAN?’
“We saw before the pandemic and the economic crisis that followed,” Biden said, “Millions of retirees were at risk of losing their retirement security through no fault of their own, based on conditions and unrelenting attacks on unions that were taking place.”
But some pension experts are skeptical of the plan, and are raising concerns.
One sticking point is that the rules have changed to allow one-third of the taxpayer-provided funds to be invested in stocks, which, according to The Wall Street Journal, “overrides a previous restriction that generally limited them to investment-grade bonds.”
NEW POLLING SHOWS MAJORITY OF AMERICANS BELIEVE THE COUNTRY IS HEADING IN THE WRONG DIRECTION
In response to the plan, University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business Professor Dr. Olivia Mitchell, executive director of the school’s Pension Research Council, tweeted, “Spare me!”
She called the move “risky,” and said it is “unlikely” to keep the multi-employer plans “solvent through 2051, despite White House optimism.”
US President Joe Biden is greeted by (L-R) US Representatives Shontel Brown and Marcy Kaptur, US Senator Sherrod Brown and Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, on arrival at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport in Cleveland, Ohio, July 6, 2022. (Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images / Getty Images)
Derek Kreifels, CEO of the State Financial Officers Foundation, noted that the pension funds were in trouble long before the pandemic, asserting the move was political and a gamble for taxpayers and union workers alike.
“The White House is going to allow the same pension fund managers – who have been historically awful at their jobs – the ability to make riskier investments with not only hardworking American’s pensions, but also the nearly $100 billion worth of taxpayer dollars delivered to unions under the guise of COVID relief,” Kreifels told FOX Business.
DEM SENATE CANDIDATE HAMMERS BIDEN FOR INFLATION, TRACK RECORD: ‘NO DIFFERENT THAN THE DEVIL THAT WE FIGHT’
He added, “In truth, this is a disaster of the Biden administration’s own making, putting millions of American’s retirements at risk with terrible economic policies that are reverberating throughout every facet of our lives – from the gas pumps to the grocery stores.”
Ryan Frost, a policy analyst at Reason Foundation’s Pension Integrity Project, says whether the bailout and its new rules will work is “a mixed bag.”
People cheer as US President Joe Biden speaks about the economy and the final rule implementing the American Rescue Plans Special Financial Assistance program in Cleveland, Ohio, July 6, 2022. (Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images / Getty Images)
“Obviously it will work for these retirees as they’ll no longer be facing benefit cuts as the PBGC runs out of money, but there are zero safeguards in place to prevent the plans from running out of money again,” he said. “In fact, the bill even modifies the PBGC guarantee formula to increase the maximum potential benefits the retiree can receive.”
Frost says the question is what the trade-off will be for the U.S. taxpayer to bail out these private pensions.
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“The plans will now be projected to reach 80% funded in 30 years, using some unknown discount rate that is going to vary between each plan,” he told FOX Business. “Congress needs to come back next year and put some safeguards and strings around plans who accept this money so they don’t drop further into insolvency, risking pension cuts and requiring another ‘financial assistance’ program snuck into a $1.9 trillion budget package.”