Europe

UK - Schroder Property Investment Management has completed a £70m disposal programme of eight office, retail and industrial properties.

UK - Standard & Poor's and Chinese financial services company CITIC Securities have launched the S&P/CITIC 50 index and S&P/CITIC 300 index, designed to measure the performance of China's A-Share market.

UK - Gartmore has added the AlphaGen Currency Fund to its $4bn single manager hedge fund business.

UK - The £610m Shropshire County Council Pension Fund has hired Man Investments and Quellos Group to manage a £61m hedge fund brief.

UK - Increasing and delaying the introduction of the lifetime savings cap has not appeased senior pensions professionals.

UK - The Institute of Directors and the British Bankers' Association has launched a new diploma aimed at raising corporate governance awareness among directors.

UK - Retail giant Boots has said that its pension charge is expected to rise by £40m to £70m in 2004/05, on the back of falling bond yields and the "roll-off" of the amortisation of earlier surpluses.

UK - The NAPF is hosting a range of training courses to assist those in the pensions industry this summer.

UK - More than a quarter of firms believe pension measures in the Budget will have a negative impact on their business, a study shows.

UK - Unions want new equality regulations revised because they enable pension schemes to discriminate against same-sex couples.