19 September 2011

OECD survey - pension funds investment in infrastructure

The financial crisis has aggravated the infrastructure gap further reducing the scope for public investment, while at the same time affecting traditional sources of private capital. Institutional Investors such as pension funds may therefore play a more active role in bridging the infrastructure gap.

Infrastructure Investment – Why it is important and why pension funds are interested

Failure to make significant progress towards bridging the infrastructure gap could prove costly in terms of slower economic growth and loss of international competitiveness. Economic infrastructure drives competitiveness and supports economic growth by increasing private and public sector productivity, reducing business costs, diversifying means of production and creating jobs. Pension fund investment in infrastructure seems to be a reasonable proposition, given the potentially good match of interests. Pension funds are increasingly looking at infrastructure investment (however investment is still limited).

Infrastructure investments are attractive to institutional investors such as pension funds, as they can assist with liability driven investments and provide duration hedging. Infrastructure projects are long-term investments that could match the long duration of pension liabilities. In addition, infrastructure assets linked to inflation could hedge pension funds’ liability sensitivity to inflation. Pension funds are increasingly looking at infrastructure to diversify their portfolios, due to the low correlation of infrastructure with traditional asset classes. Since listed infrastructure tends to move in line with broader market trends, it is a commonly-held view that investing in unlisted infrastructure, although illiquid, can be beneficial to ensure proper diversification. In principle, the long-term investment horizon of pension funds and other institutional investors should make them natural investors in less liquid, long-term assets such as infrastructure.

The Infrastructure Market

Over the last decades, in OECD countries, as the share of government investment in infrastructures has declined, the private sector share has increased. Privatisations and public-private partnership models (PPPs) offered further scope for unlocking private sector capital and expertise. Looking ahead to the coming decade at the large and increasing investment needs, the supply/demand balance seems to be significantly in favour of infrastructure investors.

Setting the Scene – The pension fund market

Over the past two decades, there has been a marked shift towards funding and private sector management in pension systems, driven largely by the introduction of mandatory private pensions. Despite the recent financial crisis, the prospect for future growth for institutional investors is unabated, especially in countries where private pensions and insurance markets are still small in relation to the size of their economies. Emerging economies generally face an even greater opportunity to develop their institutional investors sectors as, with few exceptions, their financial systems are largely bank-based. Whether such growth materialises will depend on some key policy decisions, such as the establishment of a national pension system with a funded component which is nowadays a common feature in most OECD countries.

Traditionally, institutional investors have been seen as sources of long-term capital with investment portfolios built around the two main asset classes (bonds and equities) and an investment horizon tied to the often long-term nature of their liabilities. However, important developments are having an impact on their investment strategies.

The impact of the crisis, the gradual maturing of pension plan’s demographic profiles, the underfunding of Defined Benefit plans (accounting for more than 60 per cent of OECD pension assets), have underlined liquidity issues and at the same time a lower risk appetite for many investors.

Better appreciation of the interest rate sensitivity of plan liabilities and the risks of large mismatch in the characteristics of a plan assets and liabilities, translates into an increased interest in asset/liability matching, ultimately fuelling pension funds’ demand for good quality – income-oriented – inflation-linked investments that can match their liabilities.

At the same time, pension funds exposure to alternative assets continues to grow, extending a long-established trend and reflecting pension funds’ growing appetite for diversification. In recent years, investors have been considering changes in the policy asset mix to reduce exposure to the volatility of returns on publicly-traded equities. However, due to low yields on fixed-income securities, they have been implementing the change through an increased allocation to alternative assets, including real estate, private equity and infrastructure.

Regulation

Pension fund investment regulations at country level have evolved over the years in accordance with the different national public policy decisions. In general, Anglo-Saxon countries adopt the prudent person rule (PPR) in pension fund investment which requires only that funds be invested “prudently” rather than limited according to category. Furthermore, there are few restrictions on investment in specific assets. In many other countries, however, different quantitative restrictions have traditionally been applied, normally stipulating upper limits on investment in specific asset classes, including equity.

Full study

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