3M to contribute up to $500 million to global pension plans in 2018

3M Co., St. Paul, Minn., plans to contribute $300 million to $500 million in cash to its global defined benefit plans in 2018, the company announced in its 10-K filing Thursday.

In 2017, 3M contributed $964 million to its global plans — $852 million to its U.S. plans and $112 million to its international plans. Breakouts of the planned 2018 contributions were not immediately available.

As of Dec. 31, 3M's U.S. DB qualified and non-qualified assets totaled $15.69 billion and projected benefited obligations, $17.36 billion, for a funding ratio of 90.4%. As of the same date, non-U.S. DB assets totaled $6.74 billion in assets and $7.5 billion in projected obligations, for a funding ratio of 89.9%. 3M's U.S. DB plans had a funding ratio of 87% as of Dec. 31, 2016, while its non-U.S. DB plans had a funding ratio of 88.1%.

The discount rate for U.S. DB plans was 3.68% as of Dec. 31, compared to 4.21% the same time the year before. Meanwhile, the discount rate for 3M's non-U.S. DB plans was 2.41% in 2017, compared to 2.54% the prior year.

3M's U.S. DB asset allocation as of Dec. 31 was 44.4% fixed income, 22.4% equities, 14.9% hedge funds, 13.3% private equity, and 6.5% cash, offset by -1.5% to "other items to reconcile to fair value of plan assets," according to the 10-K. Its non-U.S. DB allocation as of the same date was 48.2% fixed income, 36.6% equities, 10.7% hedge funds, 3.2% private equity, and 1.5% to cash, with -0.3% to other items to reconcile to fair value of plan assets.