US - The Employees Retirement System of the City of New Orleans (NOERS) has sued Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway and Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) alleging Berkshire's planned acquisition of BNSF discriminated other investors.

NETHERLANDS - The country's three pension funds groups and the insurance association have criticised the government objective to improve pension funds' deficits by increasing the retirement age from 65 to 67.

NETHERLANDS - Listed postal company TNT Post plans to ask staff to pay pension contributions for the first time as part of a cost cutting measure meant to avoid significant layoffs.

ITALY - Collective participants joining open Italian pension funds will now be able to nominate administrators, pension watchdog COVIP said.

LATIN AMERICA - Latin American pension funds have been dropping mutual funds and tapping emerging markets exchange traded funds (ETFs) to gain exposure to non-domestic equities, industry figures said.

EUROPE/GERMANY - The European Commission asked Germany to amend its legislation on taxation of dividends paid to German pension funds, arguing the higher tax paid by foreign investors is discriminatory against non-German pension funds.

US - The Florida Retirement System Trust Fund (FRSTF) is set to divest from two more companies with business operations in Iran.

UK - The Pension Protection Fund has approved a solution to equalising benefits for guaranteed minimum pensions.

GLOBAL - Worldwide investment fund assets increased 5.4% to €14.39trn (US$21.2trn) at the end of the second quarter of 2009 due to strong inflows, data from the European Fund and Asset Management Association revealed.

NETHERLANDS - Stichting Pensioenfonds ABP chairman Ed Nijpels said he is ready to resign should the investigation on the collapse of DSB bank involve him.