The seventh annual World Pensions & Investments Forum will be held on 22 and 23 March 2018 in Paris, France. The conference focuses on “Remaking Long-Term Investment and Board Governance”; the provisional agenda can be downloaded here. The conference is organized by the World Pensions Council, the international association of pension and social security funds. It is open to representatives of pension funds, sovereign funds, government agencies, and insurance

Aetna in November 2017 sold its group life and disability insurance and absence management business to The Hartford for $1.45bn. Life and disability was the only non-health insurance related part of the business remaining after Aetna cut its property casualty insurance business in the mid-1990s. It only brought in about $2bn in premiums in 2016, while Aetna recorded $63.1bn in total revenue, and healthcare premium revenues reached $54.1bn. The

Sompo International Holdings, a Bermuda-based specialty provider of property and casualty insurance and reinsurance and wholly-owned subsidiary of Sompo Holdings of Tokyo, Japan, has launched a new strategic partnership in Africa: Sompo International will form alliances with both Sanlam Limited and SAHAM Finances through a partnership agreement executed by Sompo Japan Nipponkoa Insurance. This partnership will give access to new markets by allowing Sompo to leverage the experience and

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that between 291,000 and 646,000 people worldwide will die from seasonal influenza-related respiratory illnesses each year, higher than a previous estimate of 250,000 to 500,000. These findings are based on a multinational survey from a collaborative study by CDC and global health partners. The study appeared in a December 2017 issue of The Lancet. The new estimates, which exclude deaths