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Would emerging market pension funds benefit from international diversification: investigating wealth accumulations for pension participants

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  • Ajantha Kumara

  • Wade Pfau

Abstract

In recent years, investment portfolio selection is growing in importance for many emerging market pension funds, as pension reforms replace traditional pay-as-you-go systems with advanced funding systems. Various investment regulations are applied to the funded pensions, particularly in the form of portfolio limits for equities and international assets. With a bootstrap simulation approach, this paper attempts to quantify the impacts on retirement benefits of restricting international assets from the investment portfolios of emerging market pension funds. We find that, on average, over half of the pension portfolios of emerging market countries should be in international assets in order to maximize the expected utility of moderate and conservative pension fund participants. More generally, international assets can play a significant role in the investment portfolios for workers with risk aversion varying from aggressive to conservative. With few exceptions, the entire probability distribution of wealth accumulations at retirement could be shifted higher with the inclusion of international assets. Copyright Springer-Verlag 2013

Suggested Citation

  • Ajantha Kumara & Wade Pfau, 2013. "Would emerging market pension funds benefit from international diversification: investigating wealth accumulations for pension participants," Annals of Finance, Springer, vol. 9(3), pages 319-335, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:annfin:v:9:y:2013:i:3:p:319-335
    DOI: 10.1007/s10436-011-0187-5
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    JEL classification:

    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • H55 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Social Security and Public Pensions
    • G23 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Non-bank Financial Institutions; Financial Instruments; Institutional Investors

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