New Financial think tank proposes reforms to use tax relief to encourage investment in UK equities and abolish stamp duty on shares in accounts

In 2000, UK pension funds had close to 50 per cent of their assets invested in domestic stocks, according to research by think-tank New Financial. By 2024, it had dropped to 4 per cent.

New Financial, a think-tank, reckons that in the decade to 2024 some 130 companies moved their listing from Europe to America, while over 1,000 were taken private.

Research by think tank New Financial earlier this year found that just 44% of the 16 European companies that had moved across the Atlantic subsequently beat the performance of their home continent.

Around 130 European companies worth a combined $667 billion opted to either float or move their primary listing to the United States over the past decade, according to research by capital markets think tank, New Financial.

Think-tank New Financial found last year that just 4.4% of UK pension assets were held in domestic equities, which is well below the 10.1% global average.

The trend poses a “much bigger threat” for European capital markets than defections of listed companies to Wall Street, according to a new report by HSBC Global Research and think-tank New Financial.

European equity markets, stock exchanges and financial plumbing known as post-trade infrastructure are a “complex patchwork,” which creates “a huge obstacle to building bigger and better capital markets,” the think tank New Financial wrote in a 2021 report on markets fragmentation.

Women working in finance held 36% of senior positions last year, up from 35% in 2023 and 34% in 2022. The slow progress was attributed to restructuring, low turnover in senior management and hiring freezes, according to the latest report from the HM Treasury Women in Finance Charter, compiled by think tank New Financial.

A study by New Financial, a think-tank, last year found that the UK’s DC pension funds invested 2 per cent of total assets in private equity and 2 per cent in infrastructure.

At the turn of the century about 50 per cent of assets in UK pension funds were invested in British equities but this has shrunk to 4.4 per cent, according to New Financial, a think tank, in a trend driven partly by regulation.

New Financial didn’t just analyse 2021 moves and IPOs. They crunched the numbers for all the big US listings of European firms over the past decade for a big report published back in April.

UK pensions sit toward the bottom of the pack when assessed on allocations to domestic equities compared with a dozen developed pension systems, according to think tank New Financial.

UK pension funds allocate just 4.4% of their assets to UK equities, down from more than half around the turn of the millennium, according to the New Financial think tank.

A study by New Financial, a think-tank, last year found that the UK’s DC pension funds invested 2 per cent of total assets in private equity and 2 per cent in infrastructure.

Anyway, the team at the New Financial think tank, which focuses on making the case for growth-friendly European capital market reform, has just put out an interesting piece of research — in partnership with HSBC Global Research — that actually puts some numbers behind the trend.

Canada’s $3.2tn pension system is a major private equity investor with 22 per cent of its public sector funds’ assets allocated to the asset class, according to think-tank New Financial.

Several UK banks like HSBC and Barclays have publicly reaffirmed their DEI commitments and representation targets. Yet the language they use has subtly shifted in many cases, switching to words like “goals”, “ambitions” or “aspirations” instead of “targets”, according to Yasmine Chinwala , partner at the New Financial think tank.

The success of these measures is clear from the increase in how much of their household assets Swedes hold in equities and investment funds. This rose from 32 per cent in 2002 to 50 per cent in 2021, according to New Financial, the London-based think tank.

UK pension schemes have among the lowest proportion of funds held in domestic stocks and private assets of any significant global pension market, according to think-tank New Financial, with just 4 per cent of assets held in domestic equities compared with a global average of 10 per cent.