For immediate release: Friday 18 March 2005

IMA SUBMITS RESPONSE TO TREASURY REVIEW OF PROGRESS IN COMPLYING WITH THE MYNERS’ PRINCIPLES

IMA has today submitted its views on the Treasury’s review of progress in complying with the Myners’ principles for institutional investment decision-making.

As managers of pension fund assets, IMA’s members have a keen interest in engaging trustees in how their investments are managed and in encouraging informed debate with respect to the investment process, investment objectives, appropriate benchmarks and realistic timescales.

IMA supports the amendment to Principle 4, Expert Advice, that proposes separate contracting, particularly for actuarial and for strategic asset allocation advice and fund manager selection and has submitted similar views to the Morris Review of the Actuarial Profession in the UK, as helping to promote competition.

The Association also welcomes the proposed amendments to Myners’ Principle 5 dealing with explicit mandates. IMA supports the need to clarify clear timescales for investment performance measurement and evaluation, in order to achieve a better understanding of how investment processes and strategy perform over time and in differing conditions.  This should address the mismatch in perception between trustees and fund managers that the structure of mandates is too short-term.

Richard Saunders, Chief Executive of the IMA, commented:

“The proposed amendments to the Myners’ principles further enhance the existing regime. IMA welcomes the action that has already been taken by a large number of pensions funds and supports efforts to improve the expertise of trustees in order to equip them to challenge their advisers.”

IMA’s response is attached.

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For further information, please contact:
Helen Stephenson, Communications Officer, IMA, 020 7831 0898

Out of hours contact:
Mona Patel, Head of Communications, IMA, 07834 089332