Four Nordic Pension Plans Commit $700 Million to Renewable Energy

Three Danish pension funds and one Norwegian plan have invested $700 million in a renewable energy infrastructure fund.

The four Nordic funds, $35.2 billion PensionDanmark, ATP ($125 billion), Laegernes Pension ($134 billion), and Norway’s Kommunal Landspensionkasse ($700 million), will focus their environmental, social, and governance (ESG) efforts on mostly Asian and Latin American infrastructure projects. They are pooling their ESG investments in a new vehicle to manage the money, the Copenhagen Infrastructure New Markets Fund I portfolio.

The infra-fund will also target select countries in Eastern Europe and Africa, its parent, Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, said in a statement. Targeted projects will include wind, solar, and biomass and transmission grid systems over a 10-year period.

Copenhagen Infrastructure also expects the new markets fund to grow to at least $1 billion before it closes in February.

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PensionDanmark has committed $250 million so far, and ATP, Copenhagen Infrastructure’s newest client of the bunch, is expected to invest about the same. Laegernes and Kommunal have injected the remaining $200 million.

Torben Möger Pedersen, PensionDanmark chief and a member of Copenhagen Infrastructure’s investment committee, called the consortium a “natural next step” to show investors ESG opportunities in new growth markets in Asia and Latin America.

“The investment case is illustrating how to mobilize private capital in large scale to the green transition and thereby contribute to the global climate agenda,” he said.

Niels Holst will be the New Markets Fund’s portfolio manager. He comes from Capricorn Real Assets, a financial advisory firm. Copenhagen Infrastructure has also hired a new team from other institutions to help Holst steer the ship.

Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners has five funds under managements, which hold $8.4 billion in commitments.

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Tags: ATP, Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, Denmark, ESG, Infrastructure, PensionDanmark, Renewable Energy

UK workplace pensions watchdog The Pensions Regulator (TPR) has fined a corporate professional trustee firm nearly £104,000 for breaching multiple areas of pension law. The penalty is the largest fine handed to trustees by TPR.

Kent-based Link Pension Trustees Limited was fined £73,750 by TPR’s independent Determinations Panel for failing to obtain audited accounts for the plan for four consecutive years, not providing members with Statutory Money Purchase Illustrations (SMPI) for two consecutive years, and for neglecting to report those six breaches of law to TPR.

In a separate action arising from the same investigation, the trustee of the master trust plan was also fined £30,000 by TPR for failing to have at least three trustees on a master trust board.

“These were breaches of several important statutory obligations, which had occurred over several years,” said the Determinations Panel in its ruling. “They deprived members of information and a level of protection regarding their pension pots,” it said, adding that “the Panel would have expected better of a corporate professional trustee, particularly one that had been warned about breaches of one of the same obligations in 2011-12.”

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The plan provides pensions for 32 franchisees of McDonald’s restaurants, but is independent of the fast-food chain. It has 148 members, of which seven are active and 141 are deferred.

The breaches were identified through TPR’s engagement with all master trust plans in preparation for authorization and supervision. It is the first time TPR has used enforcement powers for the failure to provide members with SMPIs, failure to report breaches of law to TPR; and failure to have three trustees on a master trust.

“This case highlights how working more closely with master trusts as part of authorisation and supervision will expose any areas where the law is being broken and enable TPR to take action,” Nicola Parish, TPR’s executive director of Frontline Regulation, said in a release. “The good governance of pension schemes is closely linked to good outcomes for members.”

TPR said the trustee has resolved the breaches, paid the penalty, and the plan has triggered its exit from the master trust market.

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Tags: Link Pension Trustees Limited, McDonalds, Pension, The Pensions Regulator, UK