Europe

NORWAY - Strong sales of mandatory occupational pensions were not enough to counter the downturn in Norwegian and international equity markets in the second quarter, seeing Storebrand Life Insurance post a value-adjusted investment return of minus 0.4%....

UK - Sixteen pensions staff from the £2bn pension fund of brewer Scottish & Newcastle have left the firm to join Mercer as part of an outsourcing arrangement.

UK - Employers' discriminatory practices push older workers onto state benefits, fuelling a demographic timebomb, a new report has claimed.

EUROPE - Deutsche Asset Management (DeAM) has boosted its European operations with two new appointments in its target growth markets, France and the Netherlands.

NORDICS - Rune Sanbeck, previously head of institutional business at Danske Capital in Denmark, has joined Barclays Global Investors (BGI) in the London office, Global Pensions can exclusively reveal.

Uk - Schroders' assets under management (AuM) suffered a £6bn drop in the second quarter of 2006 due to volatile market conditions.

ITALY - Direct investment in funds such as hedge funds would help Italian pension funds diversify and generate alpha within portfolios which currently contain no uncorrelated assets, claimed Andrea Canavesio, partner at Mangusta Risk.

UK - Luc van Hoof has left the EIM Group to join Investec Asset Management as a new member on its board of directors.

UK - The new entrants to the defined benefit bulk annuity buy-out space are expected to exploit a technique which allows them to manage pension fund liabilities in tranches, as they break into the burgeoning market.

UK - Alan Whalley, formerly of Watson Wyatt, has joined Mercer Human Resource Consulting as chief executive of its UK company.