The ongoing market crisis hasn't changed the behavior of defined contribution plan participants, according to DC experts like Shlomo Benartzi at UCLA.

Phyllis C. Borzi will take a tougher line on DC plan fee disclosure and advice issues, taking on the powerful mutual fund industry, if she is confirmed as assistant secretary of Labor for the Employee Benefits Security Administration.

Nearly two-thirds of consultants said their defined contribution plan clients will add either a Treasury or government money market fund to emphasize capital preservation and risk management, according to a new survey.

Defined contribution plan participants are cutting their contributions as day-to-day cash needs take center stage for more people.

Defined contribution plan professionals say getting participants to save enough to ensure an adequate income at retirement is more critical than ever because of the market meltdown that wiped out huge chunks of DC plan balances.

Increasing employee contributions and deferral rates and introducing target-date funds were central goals of many of the winning campaigns in this year's Eddy Awards.

The devastation defined contribution plans suffered in last year's market mayhem is expected to lead to major changes in plan design and asset allocation, as well as increased emphasis on retirement income, industry professionals say.

Stable value managers are hoping for the best while preparing for the worst.

Retirement plan executives are worried that some big insurance companies won’t be able to pay claims on the annuity products sold to benefit plans.

Outsourced assets are expected to exceed $500 billion in the next three years, creating a broad pool of cash for both traditional and alternative asset managers to tap, according to a new research paper.

Portfolio managers who remained invested in long government securities, expecting lower interest rates and a stagnant U.S. economy, were the leaders in fixed-income performance for the year ended Sept. 30.

Defined contribution plan executives are sticking with their investment options, even as plan participants continue to shovel money out of equities and into stable value and other fixed-income-heavy strategies.

Defined benefit plan funding levels are expected to be stable in the third quarter despite the current financial crisis, while defined contribution plan participants seem to be staying the course.

Pension fund executives might turn to securitized life-settlement policies for their liability-driven investment strategies, filling the gap in the market for long-duration bonds.

Institutional investors have pumped $4.4 billion into frontier markets since the beginning of 2007, the result of a one-two combination of low global correlation and above-average returns.

Grail Advisors, an SEC registered company partly owned by merchant bank Grail Partners, intends to enter the defined contribution market by offering actively managed transparent equity exchange-traded funds.

Money managers are buying Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgage-backed securities because they believe the market has overreacted to the agencies' financial woes.

Moody's Investors Service gave its seal of approval to liability-driven investment strategies, but raised concerns about counterparty risk when pension funds use synthetics to extend the duration of their bond portfolios.

A month ago, a Pensions & Investments round table of investment experts predicted that the credit crunch is far from over. Today, their warnings of further carnage are ringing true.