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Pension Funds and Financial Innovation

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Zvi Bodie
Abstract

Pension funds have played a critical role in the evolution of the markets for debt and equity securities and their derivatives in the U.S. over the last 15 years. The new securities and markets can largely be explained as responses to the investment demands of pension funds in an environment of increased interest rate volatility and tighter regulation. Defined benefit pension plans offer annuities that have a guaranteed floor specified by the benefit formula. In order to minimize the cost to the sponsor of providing this guarantee, there is a strong incentive to invest an amount equal to the present value of the accumulated benefit obligation in fixed- income securities with a matching duration. The pursuit of duration matching and related immunization strategies by pension funds has contributed to the emergence and rapid growth of markets for zero coupon bonds, GIC's, CMO's, options, and financial futures contracts. Recent changes in accounting rules (FAS 87) and tax law (OBRA) are likely to reinforce the use of immunization strategies.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 3101.

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Date of creation: Aug 1991
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:3101

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  1. J. Michael Harrison & William F. Sharpe, 1982. "Optimal Funding and Asset Allocation Rules for Defined-Benefit Pension Plans," NBER Working Papers 0935, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  2. Petersen, Mitchell A, 1992. "Pension Reversions and Worker-Stockholder Wealth Transfers," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 107(3), pages 1033-56, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Jeremy I. Bulow & Lawrence H. Summers & Lawrence H. Summers, 1987. "How Does the Market Value Unfunded Pension Liabilities?," NBER Chapters, in: Issues in Pension Economics, pages 81-110 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!]
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  4. Treynor, Jack L, 1977. "The Principles of Corporate Pension Finance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 32(2), pages 627-38, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Bulow, Jeremy I, 1982. "What Are Corporate Pension Liabilities?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 97(3), pages 435-52, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Jeffrey Pontiff & Andrei Shleifer & Michael S. Weisbach, 1990. "Reversions of Excess Pension Assets after Takeovers," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 21(4), pages 600-613, Winter. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Sharpe, William F., 1976. "Corporate pension funding policy," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 3(3), pages 183-193, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Modigliani, Franco. & Cohn, Richard A., 1984. "Inflation and corporate financial management," Working papers 1572-84., Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Sloan School of Management. [Downloadable!]
  9. Ross, Stephen A, 1989. " Institutional Markets, Financial Marketing, and Financial Innovation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 44(3), pages 541-56, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  10. Langetieg, T. C. & Findlay, M. C. & da Motta, L. F. J., 1982. "Multiperiod Pension Plans and ERISA," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 17(04), pages 603-631, November. [Downloadable!]
  11. Martin Feldstein, 1983. "Should Private Pensions Be Indexed?," NBER Chapters, in: Financial Aspects of the United States Pension System, pages 211-230 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!]
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