As 2022 draws to a close, European Pensions takes a look back at some of the biggest and most-read stories from the year.

Swedish government announces minimum pension age increase

This year’s most-read story on European Pensions was a big one: The Swedish parliament’s announcement that the minimum pension age would increase in 2023. From 2023, the minimum age at which individuals can begin to draw on their general pension will increase from 62 to 63. This means that people born in 1961 or later will have to be 63 years old to be able to withdraw from their general pension next year. The government also announced that retirement ages will be linked to a target age from 2026.

Irish government announces state pension reform

The second most-read story was also a government announcement on pension reform, this time to the state pension in Ireland. In September, Irish Minister for Social Protection, Heather Humphreys, announced “landmark” reforms to the state pension system in Ireland, with a new ‘flexible’ system to be introduced. Under the new system, which will be introduced in January 2024, the state pension age will remain at 66 but people will have the option to continue working until the age of 70 in return for a higher pension.

Pension investors urged to stress test and conduct contingency plans on portfolios

This year was characterised by global geopolitical and financial turmoil, and this subject was clearly on our readers minds as our article on international economist Dame DeAnne Julius’s call for pension investors to stress test their portfolios was read by many. She also urged pension investors to have contingency plans in place amid the tense geopolitical landscape and uncertain financial markets.

AP Pension appeals to Supreme Court on historic pension transfer ruling

A court case also sparked interest this year, with many reading our story on Denmark’s AP Pension appealing to the Supreme Court to hear a case regarding a group of customers that transferred from guaranteed pensions to market interest rate pensions in the former Finanssektorens Pensionskasse (FSP) in 2011. The case concerns 176 customers who chose to give up their guaranteed pension in FSP and switch to a pension at market interest rates. Earlier in the month, the Eastern High Court ruled that AP Pension, which merged with FSP in 2021, must pay compensation to some customers. However, AP Pension argued that High Court has partly assessed the past based on current knowledge and partly disregards the assessments by the Danish Financial Supervisory Authority.

Irish Pensions Authority concerned new OMAs are not complying with Pensions Act

Moving back to Ireland for our fifth most-read story of the year, readers were interested in the Irish Pensions Authority’s concern that new one-member arrangements (OMA) were not complying with the Pensions Act. In an update, the authority issued a further reminder to trustees of OMAs established on or after 22 April 2021 of the 1 July 2022 compliance deadline and set out its position on the continued establishment of non-compliant OMAs post 1 July. Later in the year, the Irish Pensions Authority revealed that, following the compliance deadline of 1 July 2022, the authority conducted a series of inspections of OMAs established after 21 April 2021. It found that the majority of trustees did not meet the fitness and probity requirements and, in most cases, could not provide an annual compliance statement.

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