Many multinational companies are re-examining global investment policies and risk management strategies related to their retirement plans, a survey has found.
The Watson Wyatt survey found that 31% are considering moving toward a more consistent global investment policy for retirement plans. An additional 9% plan to implement such a policy in the next three years. Even more, about 21% are implementing a consistent global risk management policy over the next three years and another 20% are considering such a policy.
On another topic, the majority of companies(72%)say they have problems implementing policies worldwide because of regional legal and regulatory issues. As a result, many of the changes that multinationals have been modest, such as setting consistent contribution levels to defined contribution(DC)plans.
However, most companies don’t have a governance system in place to review DC plans. Sixty percent of firms say DC investment options are never reviewed by corporate headquarters or are reviewed only on an ad hoc basis.
“Successful multinational organizations often have a huge range of retirement plans for their employees worldwide which, together with variations in local laws, makes oversight of these plans a challenge,” says Simon Gilliat, global head of Watson Wyatt’s international practice.
There were 101 multinational firms based in 20 countries that participated in the survey.
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