Benefits November 17, 2003

Workers Growing More Confident About Retirement Saving

November 17, 2003 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - The vast majority (83%) of Americans who have tried to set a financial target for retirement say the exercise had a moderate to large impact on moving them closer to their dream of a comfortable retirement.
Reported by

By comparison, only 61% say that regular saving each month without a set goal has had this kind of impact, according to Manulife USA’s Financial Dreams and Fears of American Workers Study. “These findings parallel Manulife USA’s research with employees who participate in the 401(k) plans we provide services to through our group annuity contract,” said Ralph Vizl, Vice President of Strategy and Research for Group Pensions, Manulife USA.

For more stories like this, sign up for the PLANSPONSOR NEWSDash daily newsletter.

“Again and again 401(k) participants have told us what a difference setting and working toward a goal makes and how much more confident they feel about retirement after doing this,” Vizl continued. In fact, American workers on the whole have become more optimistic with regard to their financial futures over the past year (See Workers Turn To Employers For Help, Solace ) as shown through how well people feel they are doing in reaching the dream of having a comfortable retirement. Overall, only 67% of American workers now say they are behind schedule or have not started saving for retirement, compared with 75% responding the same in 2002. Further, comfortable retirement has moved up the priority totem pole, with 70% saying it is one of their top two financial dreams, up from 61% in 2002.

Other rays of sunshine were found in an increase in the share of workers surveyed who feel they are doing a good job saving money, with 41% stating they feel excellent or very good, up 8% from 2002. In addition, more than a third (38%) think the economy will get better over the next 12 months, compared to 24% who think it will get worse.

Not surprising then, the confidence has carried over to workers’ opinions about investing, as the survey finds more interest expressed in investing in equities, with 28% growing more comfortable investing in them and only 19% expressing increased comfort investing in more conservative financial products like certificates of deposit. At the same time, the number of financial fears American workers have has dropped to an average of 5.2 financial fears in 2003 out of nine possible, down from 5.6 in 2002.

However, even with two steps forward, there is one step back in that more than half of American workers surveyed still believe they are behind schedule or worse in saving for their retirement and other financial dreams. In fact, one half of all American workers have not tried to calculate how much money they need to have saved by the time they retire, the study found.

Investing November 14, 2003

MSCI: Hedge Fund Composite 1.9% Higher in October

November 14, 2003 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - Preliminary results show the MSCI Hedge Fund Composite Index gained 1.9% in October.
Reported by

With 65% of the funds reporting, the Composite’s gain is higher than September’s 1.6% (See   MSCI: Hedge Funds Harvest 1.6% Gain in September ), yet lower than the MSCI World Equity Index, which up 5.8%.  For the year, the Composite index is up 13.3%, underperforming its World counterpart’s 21.5% return, according to a MSCI news release.

Compared to the World Sovereign Debt Index, which returned a negative 0.5% in October, the Composite index was better for the month.  For the year, the World Sovereign Debt Index has now returned 8.8%.

For more stories like this, sign up for the PLANSPONSOR NEWSDash daily newsletter.

Group Report

October’s largest process group gainer, based on 67% of funds reporting, was the Security Selection group, up 2.6%.   Security Selection, those managers who combine long positions and short sales with the aim of benefiting from their ability in selecting investments while offsetting systematic market risks, has now returned 16.9% year-to-date.

The remain four indexes also posted positive monthly returns, lead by the Multi-Process Group and Specialist Credit Indices’ 1.8%-October returns.   Multi-Process, strategies that focus on spread relationships between pricing components of financial assets or commodities, has now returned 16.9% year-to-date on a 55% reporting rate while Specialist Credit, those funds that seek to lend to credit-sensitive issuers, has now returned 18.6% year-to-date based on 58% of funds reporting.

Rounding out the list was a 1.6% gain notched by the Directional Trading Index and a 0.8% October return posted by the Relative Value Index. With 75% of funds reporting, Directional Trading, strategies based upon speculating on the direction of market prices of currencies, commodities, equities, and bonds in the futures and cash markets, is up 9.9% year-to-date.  Similarly, Relative Value is also positive for the year 7.1%, with 59% of funds reporting.

The MSCI Hedge Fund Indices are composed of more than 190 indices. More than 1,800 hedge funds have agreed to participate in the database and there are over 1,600 hedge funds currently in the MSCI Hedge Fund Indices and Database.

«