LONDON (Reuters) – Britons fear a cash-strapped retirement but fail to plan for their old age, while Asians look forward to bumper pensions for which they are actively planning, a study by HSBC bank showed Thursday.

Fifty-seven percent of the 1,000 respondents aged between 30 and 59 years expect work-based pensions to become less and less generous, but their global peers are streets ahead in their efforts to plan for the likely shortfall.

“The emergence of this ostrich generation is a real concern. Britons know that they need to plan and save more for their retirement, yet they are not turning this knowledge into action,” said David Wells, head of investments, pensions and savings at HSBC.

Mark Twigg, executive director at Cicero Consulting and report author, said women in their 50s, who often have little or no personal pension savings, are the most pessimistic.

Among UK respondents, people who think they will be worse off than their parents outnumber those who think the opposite by 22 percent — the largest percentage after France and the United States, where reforms to generous state and corporate pensions are also set to cut pension incomes.

Pension reforms aimed at avoiding poverty in old age by encouraging savings have not yet sunk in with Britons either.

Only 42 percent of the UK sample has heard of the new National Employment Savings Trust (NEST), the pension scheme designed to cater for low to medium income workers with no pension schemes from 2012.

LONDON, May 26 (Reuters) – Britons fear a cash-strapped retirement but fail to plan for their old age, while Asians look forward to bumper pensions for which they are actively planning, a study by HSBC (HSBA.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) bank showed on Thursday.

Fifty-seven percent of the 1,000 UK respondents aged between 30 and 59 years expect work-based pensions to become less and less generous, but their global peers are streets ahead in their efforts to plan for the likely shortfall.

“The emergence of this ostrich generation is a real concern. Britons know that they need to plan and save more for their retirement, yet they are not turning this knowledge into action,” said David Wells, head of investments, pensions and savings at HSBC.

Mark Twigg, executive director at Cicero Consulting and report author, said women in their 50s, who often have little or no personal pension savings, are the most pessimistic.

Among UK respondents, people who think they will be worse off than their parents outnumber those who think the opposite by 22 percent — the largest percentage after France and the United States, where reforms to generous state and corporate pensions are also set to cut pension incomes.

Pension reforms aimed at avoiding poverty in old age by encouraging savings have not yet sunk in with the British public either.

Only 42 percent of the UK sample has heard of the new National Employment Savings Trust (NEST), the pension scheme designed to cater for low to medium income workers with no pension schemes from 2012. [ID:nLDE72O1FR]

LONDON, May 16 (Reuters) – The UK agency that pays the pensions of employees from companies that go bankrupt will give pension funds with less risky investment strategies a discount on its annual levy as part of a new regime unveiled on Monday.

The new annual levy system adopted by the Pension Protection Fund (PPF) will reflect for the first time how the schemes invest their money. While not likely to impact the total levy size, it will affect how much each scheme will contribute.

“Pension funds have got to decide for themselves their (investment) strategy, all we can do is ensure that we treat everybody fairly to reflect that some strategies are going to expose us to a greater risk,” PPF Chief Executive Alan Rubenstein told Reuters.

This method allows each fund to pay a levy proportional to the risk it will need PPF protection, he said.

The PPF was launched in 2005 to take over the assets and liabilities of any UK-based defined benefit pension scheme if an employer goes bankrupt.

The PPF plans to collect an estimated 600 million pounds ($975.2 million) from its members for the 2011/12 levy. [ID:nLDE68T1FC]

If the new regime had been in place in time for the 2011/12 levy, a pension fund whose funding level — the proportion of assets against its obligations — was rated as “very high” with an insolvency risk rated “low” could have secured an annual levy decrease of 12.3 million pounds.

LONDON, May 12 (Reuters) – A Greek debt restructuring is inevitable and recovery estimates of up to 60 cents a euro are optimistic, the global head of fixed income at State Street Global Advisors said on Thursday.

“We might actually think that in some cases the 50 to 60 cent (on the euro trading) price is optimistic… there may be a greater need for restructuring,” Kevin Anderson, who leads a team running $375 billion in fixed income assets, said.

State Street (STT.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), the world’s third largest institutional investor, stopped investing in Greek sovereign debt last June after many sovereign debt indices excluded the country’s debt.

Anderson said Greek sovereign bonds are currently in “limbo” because they have dropped out of most developed market indices and do not classify as emerging market debt either.

Greece is waiting to find out if it will get the fifth aid instalment from a 110 billion euro ($153.7 billion) bailout offered by the European Union and the International Monetary Fund last year. [ID:nLDE74B0YY]

Without the next 12 billion euro tranche, Greece would default. The IMF and EU officials are also considering more favourable terms to avoid a debt restructuring. [ID:nLDE74B0B5]

State Street is also underweight in the debt of Portugal and Ireland, while keeping neutral on Spain, which Anderson said is unlikely to “be tipped over the edge” into default.

LONDON (Reuters) – European mutual fund managers sense an opportunity to drive down the price of Glencore International’s GLEN.UL bumper $11 billion listing, as fears of slowing global economic growth rattles commodity markets.

The Reuters-Jefferies CRB index, a benchmark for commodities prices, is on course for its biggest weekly plunge since July 2008 as Glencore’s top brass begin a roadshow aimed at charming investors, some of whom remain skeptical about the Swiss trader’s corporate governance and its motivations for listing.

Glencore, the world’s largest diversified commodities trader, has already lined up buyers for all of the shares in its planned float. Part of that success is due to the relatively small stake in the company being placed with funds, and also due to Glencore’s size, which makes is a must-buy for many.

“My feeling is that if … the rout we saw yesterday carries on in the next weeks before they are actually trading, these guys might be forced to come out again and revise this thing lower,” a portfolio manager at a UK investment house said.

“I’m not saying the demand is not there. It’s just the intensity of that demand has moderated,” he said.

The Reuters-Jefferies CRB index shed two-thirds of its 2011 gains on May 5, the day after Glencore set a 480-580 pence price range, a call it feels is modest enough to secure a positive start for its shares when they begin trading on May 24.

That range values Glencore at 36.5 billion pounds ($60 billion) at the mid-point, but the tumble in oil and precious metals prices has reminded investors of perils in commodities markets and further dented confidence in Glencore’s valuation.

LONDON (Reuters) – European mutual fund managers sense an opportunity to drive down the price of Glencore International’s GLEN.UL bumper $11 billion listing, as fears of slowing global economic growth rattles commodity markets.

The Reuters-Jefferies CRB index, a benchmark for commodities prices, is on course for its biggest weekly plunge since July 2008 as Glencore’s top brass begin a roadshow aimed at charming investors, some of whom remain skeptical about the Swiss trader’s corporate governance and its motivations for listing.

Glencore, the world’s largest diversified commodities trader, has already lined up buyers for all of the shares in its planned float. Part of that success is due to the relatively small stake in the company being placed with funds, and also due to Glencore’s size, which makes is a must-buy for many.

“My feeling is that if … the rout we saw yesterday carries on in the next weeks before they are actually trading, these guys might be forced to come out again and revise this thing lower,” a portfolio manager at a UK investment house said.

“I’m not saying the demand is not there. It’s just the intensity of that demand has moderated,” he said.

The Reuters-Jefferies CRB index shed two-thirds of its 2011 gains on May 5, the day after Glencore set a 480-580 pence price range, a call it feels is modest enough to secure a positive start for its shares when they begin trading on May 24.

That range values Glencore at 36.5 billion pounds ($60 billion) at the mid-point, but the tumble in oil and precious metals prices has reminded investors of perils in commodities markets and further dented confidence in Glencore’s valuation.

LONDON (Reuters) – Aberdeen Asset Management posted a 54 percent rise in half-year pretax profit on Tuesday, aided by a rise in high-fee earning business that partly offset an unexpected surge in outflows.

The British-based fund manager reported pretax profit for the six months to end-March of 143 million pounds.

It shed 749 million pounds of client cash in the period lagging a forecast of 700 million pounds net inflows from Royal Bank of Scotland analysts.

During the first half, only Aberdeen’s equities strategies enjoyed net new business, while its fixed income, property and money market products suffered fresh redemptions as investors moved more money into riskier asset classes to tackle inflation.

Emerging market equities products also saw inflows slow down in the second quarter amid worries some markets might have reached their peak.

Aberdeen Chief Executive Martin Gilbert told journalists the company had seen a “dramatic slowdown” in net outflows from its fixed income range, to 600 million pounds at the end of the second quarter from 2 billion pounds three months earlier.

But he said global interest rate rises would likely create more volatile bond markets in the next couple of years, feeding into “significant” interest in global equity and emerging market equity strategies, into which inflows had “accelerated again” in March, Gilbert added.

LONDON, May 3 (Reuters) – Aberdeen Asset Management (ADN.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) posted a 54 percent rise in half-year pretax profit on Tuesday, aided by a rise in high-fee earning business that partly offset an unexpected surge in outflows.

The British-based fund manager reported pretax profit for the six months to end-March of 143 million pounds ($239 million).

It shed 749 million pounds of client cash in the period lagging a forecast of 700 million pounds net inflows from Royal Bank of Scotland analysts.

During the first half, only Aberdeen’s equities strategies enjoyed net new business, while its fixed income, property and money market products suffered fresh redemptions as investors moved more money into riskier asset classes to tackle inflation.

Emerging market equities products also saw inflows slow down in the second quarter amid worries some markets might have reached their peak.

Aberdeen Chief Executive Martin Gilbert told journalists the company had seen a “dramatic slowdown” in net outflows from its fixed income range, to 600 million pounds at the end of the second quarter from 2 billion pounds three months earlier.

But he said global interest rate rises would likely create more volatile bond markets in the next couple of years, feeding into “significant” interest in global equity and emerging market equity strategies, into which inflows had “accelerated again” in March, Gilbert added.

LONDON (Reuters) – British police arrested 56 people in London Friday for a range of mostly minor offences as they mounted one of the biggest security operations ever seen in the capital around the royal wedding.

Around 5,000 officers were on duty to control the huge flag-waving crowds, alongside around 1,000 soldiers lining the route from Westminster Abbey to Queen Elizabeth’s London residence, Buckingham Palace.

Specialist teams with sniffer dogs had patrolled the procession route searching for explosives, while helicopters buzzed overhead as part of the operation to protect Prince William and his new wife Kate Middleton.

By 1615 GMT, a Metropolitan Police spokesman said there had been 56 arrests. Most of those detained were held for minor public order offences.

Police arrested 10 people at Charing Cross railway station after they were found to be carrying anti-royalist placards.

One million people lined the route between the church and Buckingham Palace and 500,000 watched the couple appear on the palace balcony after the service, police estimated.

REPUBLICAN PROTESTS

LONDON (Reuters) – British police arrested 18 people in London on Friday for a range of mostly minor offences as they mounted one of the biggest security operations ever seen in the capital around the royal wedding.

Around 5,000 officers were on duty to control the huge flag-waving crowds, alongside around 1,000 soldiers lining the route from Westminster Abbey to Queen Elizabeth’s London residence, Buckingham Palace.

Specialist teams with sniffer dogs had patrolled the procession route searching for explosives, while helicopters buzzed overhead as part of the operation to protect Prince William and his new wife Kate Middleton.

By 1000 GMT, a Metropolitan Police spokesman said there had been 18 arrests, including one on suspicion of sexual assault, three for being drunk and three for theft.

Spectators who waited hours for a glimpse of the royal couple in their open-top, horse-drawn carriage said the mood was jubilant, despite the crowds and heavy police presence.

“Considering the number of people here, it’s all very light hearted,” said Becton Davis, 42, who lives in London but is originally from North Carolina. “The atmosphere’s lovely.”

REPUBLICAN PROTESTS