United Kingdom

UK - Offshore fund markets are proving robust with the investment industries of Guernsey and Jersey raking in a combined US$164.8bn in funds managed and fund serviced at the end of June, 2003.

UK - ISIS has strengthened its bond team with the addition of Adam Mossakowski as an assistant fund manager. Mossakowski joins ISIS from Axa where he was junior investment manager on the sterling investment grade fixed income team.

UK - Half of the country's top directors have adopted "best practice" in their boardrooms following sustained pressure from shareholders, new research suggests.

UK - Fidelity Investments is to offer two further retail funds to bolster the range available to DC scheme members.

UK - Raising the state retirement age should not be seen as a standalone policy but as an "important trade-off" in pensions reform, a new study says.

UK - Compulsion must be introduced to prevent an over-reliance on the state benefit system.

UK - The 21st century presents new challenges to saving for retirement. The process of globalisation has brought the world closer together with a free-flowing movement of goods and money, says Mary Davies, director in the Pre-Retirement Association.

UK - Bank of Ireland Asset Management (BIAM) has appointed Alice O'Dowd as institutional client service manager.

SWITZERLAND/UK - Zurich Financial Services has completed the sale of the closed business of Zurich Life Assurance Company, one of Zurich's UK life businesses, to Swiss Re.

UK - Rising confidence in the manufacturing sector will come as a ray of hope to the industry's stifled pension schemes, claims the Confederation of British Industry (CBI).