Media Releases

Defining “Defined Ambition” pension plans tackled in the Spring journal from Rotman International Centre for Pension Management

May 29, 2013

TORONTO, ON – The pen­sions world is rewrit­ing its nar­ra­tives as the impli­ca­tions of the 21st Cen­tu­ry real­i­ties of low­er invest­ment returns and aging pop­u­la­tions con­tin­ue to sink in. Defend­ing tra­di­tion­al defined ben­e­fit plans at all cost is increas­ing­ly seen as fight­ing a rear­guard action in a lost cause. The Spring 2013 issue of the Rot­man Inter­na­tion­al Jour­nal of Pen­sion Man­age­ment takes a look at “defined ambi­tion” nar­ra­tives for pen­sions in which a dual ques­tion needs to be answered: What do sus­tain­able 21st Cen­tu­ry pen­sion arrange­ments look like… and how do we get from here to there?

With con­tri­bu­tions from pen­sion prac­ti­tion­ers and aca­d­e­mics, the jour­nal is pub­lished by the Rot­man Inter­na­tion­al Cen­tre for Pen­sion Man­age­ment (Rot­man ICPM) at the Rot­man School of Man­age­ment at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to.

“The arti­cles in the Spring 2013 issue of the Jour­nal reflects the grow­ing accep­tance that we must rewrite the pen­sions nar­ra­tive” says Jour­nal edi­tor, Kei­th Ambacht­sheer who is also Direc­tor of Rot­man ICPM and an adjunct pro­fes­sor of finance at the Rot­man School.

Arti­cles in the Spring 2013 issue include:

· The “Defined Ambi­tion” Pen­sion Plan: A Dutch Inter­pre­ta­tion by Niels Kortleve;

· Restruc­tur­ing Occu­pa­tion­al Pen­sion Plans in Cri­sis: A U.S. Labor–Management Case Study by David S. Blitzstein;

· Dynam­ic DC: Keep­ing Your Options Open by Iou­lia Tre­ti­ako­va and Mark S. Yama­da;

· Why Cana­da Has No Retire­ment Cri­sis by Fred Vettese;

· Risk-Man­age­ment Prac­tices at Large Pen­sion Plans: Find­ings from a Unique 27-Fund Sur­vey by Alex Beath and Jody Mac­In­tosh;

· When Do Deriv­a­tives Add Val­ue in Pen­sion Fund Asset Allo­ca­tion? by Jia­jia Cui, Bart Old­enkamp, and Michel Vellekoop;

· The Kay Review on Long-Hori­zon Invest­ing: A Guide for the Per­plexed by Gor­don L. Clark; and,

· Plat­forms and Vehi­cles for Insti­tu­tion­al Co-Invest­ing by Jagdeep Singh Bach­her and Ash­by H. B. Monk.

There is also an update on four new research projects that the Rot­man ICPM Research Com­mit­tee has select­ed for fund­ing over the 2013/2014 peri­od. Since its incep­tion in 2005, Rot­man ICPM has invest­ed $1.3M in pro­duc­ing 29 high-impact research projects and six “live” case stud­ies about strate­gic issues in the pen­sion indus­try. In total, 66 promi­nent researchers and case writ­ers have con­tributed to these efforts. Com­plet­ed Research Papers can be accessed through the Rot­man ICPM web­site.

Jour­nal arti­cles are avail­able at no charge online at www.rijpm.com/journal/journal/ or as a flip­book here.

The next issue of the Jour­nal is sched­uled for release in Fall 2013.

The mis­sion of the Rot­man Inter­na­tion­al Cen­tre for Pen­sion Man­age­ment (Rot­man ICPM) is to be an inter­na­tion­al­ly-rec­og­nized, high-impact cat­a­lyst for fos­ter­ing effec­tive pen­sion design and man­age­ment. Its four pri­ma­ry tools to achieve this goal are the fund­ing of objec­tive and trans­for­ma­tive research, the orga­ni­za­tion of inter­ac­tive, action-ori­ent­ed dis­cus­sion forums, the pub­li­ca­tion of a read­able jour­nal rel­e­vant to pro­fes­sion­als in the pen­sions and relat­ed fields, and the deliv­ery of the globe’s lead­ing gov­er­nance edu­ca­tion pro­gram for Board mem­bers of pen­sion and oth­er long-hori­zon invest­ment insti­tu­tions. Fur­ther details on the Cen­tre, includ­ing access to the Rot­man Jour­nal of Inter­na­tion­al Pen­sion Man­age­ment, are avail­able at www.rotman.utoronto.ca/icpm/.

The Rot­man School of Man­age­ment at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to is redesign­ing busi­ness edu­ca­tion for the 21st cen­tu­ry with a cur­ricu­lum based on Inte­gra­tive Think­ing. Locat­ed in the world’s most diverse city, the Rot­man School fos­ters a new way to think that enables the design of cre­ative busi­ness solu­tions. The School is cur­rent­ly rais­ing $200 mil­lion to ensure Cana­da has the world-class busi­ness school it deserves. For more infor­ma­tion, vis­it www.rotman.utoronto.ca.

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For more infor­ma­tion, con­tact:

Ken McGuf­fin
Man­ag­er, Media Rela­tions
Rot­man School of Man­age­ment
Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to
Voice 416.946.3818
E‑mail mcguffin@rotman.utoronto.ca
Fol­low Rot­man on Twit­ter @rotmanschool
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