Products August 6, 2007

Securian Adds 11 New Funds to Menu

August 6, 2007 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - Securian Retirement Distributors says that 11 new investment options are now available to qualified retirement plan sponsors.
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According to a press release, that brings the firm’s full array to 71 variable options from 30 fund families along with two guaranteed accounts.  The firm said that especially noteworthy is the addition of an international index option, which means the firm’s array now offers the ability to cover all the major asset classes with a passively managed investment option. A new multisector bond fund offers yet another option in the specialty asset class for those seeking a differentiator-type investment. 

New Options

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The new investment options include:

Separate Account NameUnderlying Investment Option
Multisector Bond ILoomis Sayles Bond Fund, Institutional Class
Small Value Equity XIIDreman Contrarian Small Cap Value Fund, Class I
Small/Mid Value Equity IIIDFA U.S. Targeted Value Portfolio
Small Growth Equity XIIIAllianz RMC Small-Cap Growth Fund, Institutional Class
Small/Mid Growth Equity IIIAlger SmallCap and MidCap Growth Fund, Class A
Mid-Cap Value Equity IVRiverSource Mid Cap Value Fund, Class R5
Large Equity VIIIJanus Adviser INTECH Risk-Managed Core Fund, Class I
Large Growth Equity XTurner Core Growth Fund, Investor Class
International Core Index IAmerican Beacon International Equity Index Fund, Institutional Class
International Growth IIVan Kampen International Growth Fund, Class I Shares
International Core IIIJulius Baer International Equity Fund II, Class I
Administration August 4, 2007

Pension Fund Bond Demands Exceed Supply

April 20, 2006 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) says that pension fund demand for high quality bonds may be exceeding supply by a considerable margin, backing long-held complaints from the funds that governments are not meeting their needs.
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According to Reuters, in a report on trends in financial markets, the group said it had tried to gauge the size of potential pension fund demand in Group of 10 countries for bonds and to match it to current supply, and concluded that “pent-up demand could be very substantial.”   OECD added that potential shortages would vary depending on the maturity and currency of bond issuance.

“Potential ‘scarcity’ would be greatest (in absolute values) in the United States and in the maturity segment beyond 10 years,” it said, according to Reuters.

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The OECD noted that G10 pension funds held about $15 trillion in 2004 while the amount of long-term government debt came to less than $4 trillion. A gap that wide would mean even a modest allocation to long-term government debt would run into scarcity, but the OECD suggested that a 75% allocation for pension funds was not unrealistic.

Long-term yields have remained relatively low, in part because of pension funds increasingly seeking long-term debt in order to meet liability matching requirements imposed on them by regulators.   The OECD suggested that it may also be because other investors may have been acquiring bonds in anticipation of significantly increased pension fund buying in the future.

The OECD Web site is www.oecd.org .

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