This is your daily pension announcement. The Pension War Room™️is obliged to inform that @aimcoinvests does NOT have any crypto investments. So that toxic waste dump has been avoided (ON teachers lost millions with the FTX collapse.) #AbLeg #greatnews
LAPP Q3 results are out. After all the positive months, things have turned not positive. Q3 had a -0.3% return, which on its own does not mean anything. Compared to the benchmark of +0.5% it is not good. Far too short of a time period to make firm conclusions. #AbLeg
LAPP year-to-date so far is -8.9% versus a benchmark -9.5%. Though a loss this is good: @aimcoinvests added value by not losing as much as its passive benchmark did. Not a cause for concern at all. #AbLeg #handsoffmypension
And finally, this piece from @ewsiddall. While it may be dismissed as a profile piece, it shouldn't be. I am a big believer in financial literacy in school curriculum and life in general. #AbLeg

theglobeandmail.com/business/comme…
I have spent countless hours educating people on some very erudite financial concepts.
This is not a rip on the AIMCo Foundation for Financial Education. They do good work. But, we do seem to overly rely on salespeople for major businesses to explain some complicated bits.
However, I did choke on my Wheaties at one part:

"But recently, increased social mistrust of major institutions, including governments and financial institutions such as AIMCo, seems to correlate with a gap in financial literacy." #AbLeg

WTF?
Really? Really? AIMCo earned every ounce of the mistrust it is viewed with. They did it the old fashion way by lobbying the GOA to act in AIMCo's interest while turning their backs on thousand of Albertans with retirement savings on deposit. #AbLeg
All of this happened because AIMCo (read Kevin) was concerned that some of their clients would leave because of years of sub-par results. In the process, we saw AIMCo flout the pension law of Alberta. #AbLeg #handsoffmypension
In an earlier missive @ewsiddall talked extensively about how his mission was to "rebuild trust". He should perhaps contemplate the role financial institutions, acting in their own interest, have had in the current state of affairs. #AbLeg

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More from @yomeeks

Oct 30
This is your daily pension announcement. The Pension War™️ is a spooky🦇🦇place to be! It is clear the GOA relies on confusion around the word "benchmarks" to explain away crappy decisions.
Let me use LAPP as an example. Here is DM of TBF Athana:
“LAPP set something called a value-add [target];
it’s like a stretch goal.”

What she was talking about is the "policy benchmark". #AbLeg
LAPP’s 0.85% value added expectation (aka policy benchmark) is an expectation – not a “stretch target” – of AIMCo’s active management capabilities; the investment policy is very clear that this is an expectation and not an “stretch” aspiration. #AbLeg
Read 6 tweets
Oct 29
This is your daily pension announcement. The Pension War Room™️is basking in the afterglow of the Heritage Fund public meeting. Because, of course, @aimcoinvests has no other accountability to teachers or any other pension plan for that matter. #AbLeg #handsoffmypension
A couple of finer points on the q's asked. The AIMCO business case stated that other funds like Heritage should save 0.04% (out of 0.90%) in costs because of scale. We haven't seen any savings yet. TBF seems to say we can't see it or measure it even if it existed... #AbLeg
This is problematic because the GOA used that 0.04% savings as justification for a $20 billion transaction. That is weak justification. The ATRF is more specific: "we haven't seen any savings yet as a result of switching to AIMCO". #AbLeg
Read 8 tweets
Oct 23
This is your daily pension announcement. On the heels of the huge #Rally4Ed it may get lost that the tiny bit of public accountability for @aimcoinvests is this week.

This committee is having their annual public meeting.

assembly.ab.ca/assembly-busin…
"The Standing Committee on the Alberta Heritage Savings Trust Fund invites all Albertans to its annual public meeting on Thursday, October 27, 2022, at 7 p.m. Attend in person at the Queen Elizabeth II Building, 9820-107 Street."
Needless to say, @aimcoinvests will be present to answer questions about why the value add was less than target both in 5 and 10 year periods. They had a great year last year.

I will be submitting some questions, or maybe going in-person. #AbLeg
Read 5 tweets
Oct 23
This is your daily pension announcement. The Pension War Room™️ attended a huge #Rally4Ed today. Teachers that were in the crowd expressed concern about pensions and #aimcoinvests. But really the focus was on why the UCP was dismantling a leading ed system. #AbLeg
If you recall: Dr. Bob published a critical review of the MacKinnon report that the UCP blindly followed.
His findings:

"Consultation and cooperation are not necessary in reaching the Panel’s findings and recommendations."
abpolecon.ca/2019/10/30/cri…
and

"Uncritical acceptance of the government’s mandate and prescription that spending was out of control."

When in reality AB had more of a revenue problem than spending problem. #AbLeg
Read 4 tweets
Oct 8
This is your daily pension announcement: The Pension War Room™️can't help but notice that DS worked for the Fraser Institute at one time. That org is single-handedly responsible for the misinformation related to the cost of an Alberta Pension Plan. #AbLeg
I have gone through their errors many times in this space. Suffice to say, they don't include any recognition that, as a much smaller plan, contributions need to be much higher as the plan is more risky. Never mind the fact that AB demographics are changing. #AbLeg
With respect to the @aimcoinvests hearing, I did get an official response from Jason Nixon:

"With regard to your questions about the arbitration proceedings, as this is an ongoing legal matter, we are not at liberty to comment on it as this time." #AbLeg
Read 4 tweets
Oct 1
This is your daily pension announcement! Apparently, the current position of Travis is that we should have an "optional" Alberta Pension Plan. Hard to believe but this idea is more stupid than the last. #AbLeg
Defined benefit pension plans have two main advantages:
1. cost effective access to good institutional money managers. (Which would be AIMCO)
2. Mandatory participation from a young age. (Not sure how that would work in The Travis vision.)
Research does indicate that unless automatic contributions are made younger workers won't save for retirement. Which is unfortunate as that is where time to compound returns is greatest. #AbLeg
Read 6 tweets

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