The trend of corporate pension funds employing strategies to mitigate risk in their plan shows no signs of slowing, with more than 60 percent saying they would take that path this year, according to a survey by Aon Hewitt.
The survey, which looked at 220 companies with 5.8 million employees, found that by the end of the year 62 percent of plans expected to match their investments to their liabilities, a process called de-risking.
Increasing stock prices and rising interest rates in 2013 have put pension plans on their best financial footing since the start of the Great Recession. Generally, corporate defined benefit plans ended last year with funded ratios of 95 percent.
That stability allows plan sponsors to adjust the mix of their investments and increase their exposure to fixed income investments and other instruments that hedge risk.
By the end of the year, Aon Hewitt found that 30 percent of plans said they would have a full de-risking strategy in place, compared to 22 percent now.
