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Europe > Norway

You are looking at 1 - 10 of 19 items for :

  • Type: Journal Issue x
  • Social Security and Public Pensions x
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Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Ireland: Selected Issues
International Monetary Fund. European Dept.
This Selected Issues paper provides an international perspective to the authorities’ two recent policy measures: setting up new savings and counter cyclical and climate infrastructure funds and reforming the judicial review of planning decisions in Ireland. The first essay presents international best practices in the design and operation of sovereign wealth funds that could inform the setup of the two new funds in Ireland. It highlights the importance of operating the funds within a strong fiscal policy framework. The second essay reviews Ireland’s planning and permitting system, underscoring the key elements that have hindered public investment. It also looks into the government’s proposed Bill to reform the planning system and contrasts its key features with those of other international jurisdictions. It finds that several issues may contribute to the inefficiencies in the planning and judicial review system, such as the loose standing requirements and lack of mandatory timelines related to judicial review, as well as institutional governance issues within the planning board, which the newly proposed reforms and legislative measures seek to address.
Keywords:
housing affordability; D. policy option; savings fund; modernizing judicial review; impulse response; Housing; Housing prices; Pension spending; Global
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Denmark: Financial Sector Assessment Program-Technical Note-Insurance Regulation and Supervision
International Monetary Fund. Monetary and Capital Markets Department
Denmark’s insurance sector is highly developed with a particularly high penetration and density in the life sector. Traditionally, work-related life insurance and pension savings are offered as a combined package, and life insurance companies dominate the market for mandatory pension schemes for employees. The high penetration explains the overall size of the insurance sector, which exceeds those of peers from other Nordic countries and various other EU member states. Assets managed by the insurance industry amounted to 146 percent of the GDP at end-2018, compared to 72 percent for the EU average.
Keywords:
ISCR; CR; risk assessment; business intelligence tool; insurance undertaking; DFSA plan; DFSA data; DFSA staff; DFSA supervision; insurance sector; insurance supervisor; covered bond; Insurance companies; Insurance; Solvency; Pension spending; Insurance supervision; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
Public Sector Balance Sheet Database: Overview and Guide for Compilers and Users
Mr. Miguel A Alves
,
Mrs. Sage De Clerck
, and
Juliana Gamboa-Arbelaez
This paper provides an overview of the Public Sector Balance Sheet (PSBS) Database, a dataset developed in the context of the October 2018 Fiscal Monitor. The dataset provides a comprehensive picture of public wealth for 38 countries, and a narrower picture for further 37 countries and territories. Comprehensive PSBSs bring together all the accumulated assets and liabilities that governments control, including public corporations, natural resources, and pension liabilities. They therefore account for the entirety of what the state owns and owes, offering a broader fiscal picture beyond debt and deficits. This is particularly relevant in the current context of record and still rising debts and heightened risks to the balance sheet of the public sector. PSBSs bring about greater transparency and allow closer scrutiny of government’s financial position. They also allow better balance sheet management, thereby potentially increasing return on assets, reducing risks and the costs of borrowing, and improving fiscal policymaking. The paper also elaborates on the conceptual framework and methodology used in compiling the data, and provides some practical guidelines on the compilation, validation, and dissemination of such data.
Keywords:
WP; accounts payable; PSBS database; low income; return on assets; accounts receivable; fair value; investment fund; net present value; capital stock; central bank; Financial statements; Public sector; Business enterprises; Pensions; Pension spending; Global; Assets; balance sheet; converting financial statements; liabilities; mineral and energy resources; net worth; public corporations; public sector balance sheet; public wealth; government asset; historical cost; book value; reserve account; deposit assets; heritage assets
Cover IMF Working Papers
Counting the Oil Money and the Elderly: Norway's Public Sector Balance Sheet
Ezequiel Cabezon
and
Christian Henn
Based on a permanent income analysis, Gagnon (2018) has prominently suggested that Norway has saved too much, thereby free-riding on the rest of the world for demand. Our public sector balance sheet analysis comes to the opposite conclusion, chiefly because it also accounts for future aging costs. Unsurprisingly, we find that Norway’s current assets exceed its liabilities by some 340 percent of mainland GDP. But its nonoil fiscal deficits have grown very large (to almost 8 percent of mainland GDP) and aging pressures are only commencing. Therefore, Norway’s intertemporal financial net worth (IFNW) is negative, at about -240 percent of mainland GDP. As IFNW represents an intertemporal budget constraint, this implies that Norway’s savings are likely insufficient to address aging costs without additional fiscal action.
Keywords:
WP; mainland GDP; oil price; GPFG asset; asset price; asset stock; Public Sector Balance Sheet; Intertemporal Fiscal Balances; Debt Sustainability; Norway; statistics Norway; Norwegian krone; Norway's intertemporal financial net worth; Intertemporal public sector balance sheet; Norway's assets; Norway's IFNW; nonfinancial assets; GPFG consist; price development; Financial statements; Oil prices; Asset prices; Aging; Global
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Republic of Lithuania: Selected Issues
International Monetary Fund. European Dept.
This Selected Issues paper analyzes the fiscal challenges in Lithuania. Lithuania’s fiscal position has strengthened in recent years. However, medium term challenges are significant given the severe demographic pressures from population aging and net emigration. Lithuania’s net financial worth of the general government is relatively strong compared with other countries in the region although contingent liabilities from the pension system are sizable. The recent reform of the pension system will help make the system more fiscally sustainable. Upcoming reforms should be carefully designed, considering their trade-offs, to ensure social sustainability; reduce old-age poverty; and limit adverse impact on labor supply and informality.
Keywords:
ISCR; CR; Lithuania; expenditure; pensioner; household expenditure; spending gap; population structure; Pillar II; employment income; households of pensioner; retirement age; loan-deposit ratio; consumption expenditure; case of Lithuania; Macroprudential policy; Pension spending; Fiscal rules; Pensions; Global; Europe
Cover Policy Papers
Sovereign Asset-Liability Management - Guidance for Resource-Rich Economies
International Monetary Fund
Ample natural resource revenues create both opportunities and challenges for a sovereign to transform its natural resources into well-managed financial assets. Hence, inter-temporal smoothing of revenue and consumption/investment moves to the center stage of macroeconomic policies. The questions arising from natural resource wealth accumulation are becoming more pressing for many countries, given the need to achieve intergenerational equity in a context where commodity prices may not continue their upward trajectory of the past decade. Addressing these questions requires a flexible sovereign asset-liability management (SALM) framework that integrates various macroeconomic and financial trade-offs with the aim of containing financial risk to the sovereign balance sheet. The framework and policy advice aims to guide policymakers across different institutions in weighing those trade-offs.
Keywords:
PP; expected return; natural resource; excess reserves; time horizon; risk tolerance; Financial statements; International reserves; Natural resources; Government asset and liability management; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
Procyclical Behavior of Institutional Investors During the Recent Financial Crisis: Causes, Impacts, and Challenges
Mr. Michael G. Papaioannou
,
Mr. Joonkyu Park
,
Jukka Pihlman
, and
Han van der Hoorn
This paper (i) provides evidence on the procyclical investment behavior of major institutional investors during the global financial crisis; (ii) identifies the main factors that could account for such behavior; (iii) discusses the implications of procyclical behavior; and (iv) proposes a framework for sound investment practices for long-term investors. Such procyclical investment behavior is understandable and may be considered rational from an individual institution’s perspective. However, our main conclusion is that behaving in a manner consistent with longterm investing would lead to better long-term, risk-adjusted returns and, importantly, could lessen the potential adverse effects of the procyclical investment behavior of institutional investors on global financial stability.
Keywords:
WP; flight to quality; investment behavior; long-term investor; risk tolerance; asset owner; hedge fund; individual investor; investment horizon; sovereign investor; Financial crisis; long-term investments; institutional investors; procyclicality; asset allocation; asset class; endowment fund; Pension spending; Asset allocation; Liquidity; Mutual funds; Global
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Norway: 2011 Article IV Consultation: Staff Report; Public Information Notice on the Executive Board Discussion; and Statement by the Executive Director for Norway
International Monetary Fund
Norway’s near-term macroeconomic priority is to reduce risks arising from high-household debt by tightening macroprudential standards for mortgage lending while undertaking tax reforms to gradually reduce incentives for excessive leverage. Creating a stronger institutional framework for acroprudential policy would also assist risk mitigation in the future. With the output gap closing, fiscal tightening is needed over the medium term in the central scenario to rebuild precautionary buffers and ensure that fiscal guidelines are met on average over the cycle.
Keywords:
ISCR; CR; rate; GDP; holding; vis nonresident; liability positions vis; mortgage interest payment; mainland GDP; statistics Norway; Housing prices; Mortgages; Inflation; Loans; Macroprudential policy; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
Investment Objectives of Sovereign Wealth Funds: A Shifting Paradigm
Iva Petrova
,
Jukka Pihlman
,
Mr. Peter J Kunzel
, and
Miss Yinqiu Lu
While SWF investment objectives to some extent reflect inherent characteristics, notable differences in strategic asset allocation (SAA) exist even amongst SWFs of similar types. Even so, this paper shows that the global crisis may have changed SWF’s asset allocations in ways that may not be ideal or justified in all cases and that a review of investment objectives may be warranted. It also argues for regular macro-risk assessments for the sovereign, the continued importance of SWFs as a stabilizer in international capital markets, as well as the active role they could play in international regulatory reform.
Keywords:
WP; sovereign wealth fund; SWF; investment; asset; investment horizon; Sovereign Wealth Funds; Portfolio Choice; Investment and Risk Management; Government Policy and Regulation; savings SWF; SWF resource; SWF's ability; SWF objective; SWF website; cross-border operation; reserve investment corporation; savings-type SWF; stabilization SWF; SWF performance; asset-liability management consideration; Asset allocation; Reserve assets; Pension spending; Stocks; Business enterprises; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
Governance and Fund Management in the Chinese Pension System
Yu-Wei Hu
,
Gregorio Impavido
, and
Xiaohong Li
The Chinese pension system is highly fragmented and decentralized, with governance standards, pension fund management practices, their regulation and supervision varying considerably both across the funded components of the Chinese pension system and across provinces. This paper describes the key components of the system, highlights the progress made to date and identifies remaining weaknesses, in regard to information disclosure, the governance framework and pension fund management standards.
Keywords:
WP; asset manager; NSSF assets; fixed income; bank deposit; investment fund; NSSF staff; private equity