Defined Benefit

UK - Telent - the former Marconi telecoms group owned by Pension Corporation - has agreed a 15-year funding plan with trustees in a bid to shore up its pension scheme.

Telent - the former Marconi telecoms group owned by Pension Corporation - has agreed a 15-year funding plan with trustees in a bid to shore up its pension scheme.

The discount rate used to calculate scheme liabilities in company accounts should be a risk-free rate, an Accounting Standards Board report confirms.

UK - The CDC Pensions Scheme has completed a £370m (US$621.6m) buy-in with Rothesay Life.

Cable & Wireless is set to split its main UK pension scheme into two as part of demerger proposals to separate into its two businesses, Worldwide and CWI.

The CDC Pensions Scheme has completed a £370m buy-in with Rothesay Life.

PensionsFirst has launched a web-based service which will deliver actuarial valuations within 24 hours.

UK/Spain - A merger deal between British Airways and Iberia, the Spanish airline, could be terminated should BA be unable to reach a funding arrangement with its scheme trustees.

Jean-Baptiste Colbert - the French minister of finance under King Louis XIV - is said to have observed "the art of taxation consists in so plucking the goose as to obtain the largest amount of feathers with the least possible amount of hissing".

A merger deal between British Airways and Iberia, the Spanish airline, could be terminated should BA be unable to reach a funding arrangement with its scheme trustees.