United Kingdom

UK - State Street Global Advisors (SSgA) has brought to market its Pooled Asset Liability Matching Solution (PALMs) - a series of pooled vehicles which allow UK pension funds to match future liabilities in different inflation environments.

UK - Imperial Chemical Industries has doubled its exposure to emerging debt through two new mandates to improve the diversification of the fund's return-seeking assets.

UK - The UK's largest health union expressed outrage over proposals to modify the NHS pension scheme and raise the pension age to 65, vowing to fight the changes "all the way".

UK - T. Rowe Price Global Investment Services has appointed actuary Philip Garcia as a vice president of the client servicing team, focussing primarily on large institutional pension funds in Europe.

UK - Some £750m in council tax benefit goes unclaimed each year by pensioners unaware of their entitlements, according to the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP).

UK - The National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF) has appointed Joanne Segars to the new role of director of policy.

UK - TUI Pension Scheme, the £200m pension fund of travel company TUI, has slashed its exposure to UK equities by 13% and has also sacked Deutsche Asset Management and Insight Investment as its asset managers.

UK - The WM Company, the investment performance measurement company, said that UK pensions funds have returned a solid 11% in 2004 on the back of a strong equity performance in the last quarter.

UK - The trustees of Paragon pension plan in the UK have appointed Northern Trust Global Investments (NTGI) to run £18m in a range of equity and fixed income manager-of-manager funds.

UK - Watson Wyatt has welcomed the government's recent report on progress by the investment industry in adhering to the Myners principles for institutional investment decision-making.