Chancellor Jeremy Hunt will use his Mansion House speech to announce reforms aimed at releasing billions of pounds from UK pensions into high-growth companies.
Hunt is expected to tell an audience of City leaders and chief executives that the government has reached a so-called “compact” deal with some of the UK’s largest investment firms that could see about 5% of pension fund investments reserved for early-stage businesses in sectors including life sciences and fintech.
Two-thirds of the defined contribution pensions market will be covered by the reforms, dubbed the "Mansion House reforms", which will be signed by names including Aviva, Legal & General, Phoenix and Scottish Widows.
“I want to lay out plans to enable our financial services sector to increase returns for pensioners, improve outcomes for investors and unlock capital for our growth businesses,” the chancellor is likely to say in his first Mansion House speech.
The reforms are also expected to include rules to simplify rules for buying and selling shares, attempt to boost the amount of stockbroker research on listed companies and ultimately aim to deliver higher returns for investors.
On top of this, the chancellor is expected to announce plans to make share certificates in public companies fully digital, with the aim of making it simpler and cheaper for companies to manage their share registers.