Download a copy of the full investment booklet
There are two main routes you can take to choosing your investments:
Lifestyle strategies The scheme offers three lifestyle strategies.
A lifestyle is designed to address the different investment risks you face throughout your working life. Your mix of investment funds will change, automatically, according to the number of years you have before your expected retirement.
As the name suggests, the Default Lifestyle is the fund that your Pension Account will be invested in if no other instruction has been provided.
If you adopt the Lifestyle approach you should strongly consider indicating your anticipated retirement age. The default position will assume a retirement age of 65, however an indication of your anticipated retirement date will allow the lifestyle strategy to target the most appropriate date as this will have a direct impact on the investment of your Pension Account.
Your changing requirements with Lifestyle
The lifestyle strategies have been designed to hold a series of investments over the period to retirement. The investments used for your Pension Account therefore automatically change over time. The objective of these strategies is to invest in riskier assets that aim to deliver growth when you are further from retirement, but to reduce this risk as you approach retirement. The risks you face at retirement and the most appropriate strategies will depend on how you intend to access your Pension Account and when you choose to do this. All the lifestyle options assume members will wish to take 25% of their savings tax free at or during retirement.
The options are:
Self-Select – making your own investment decisions You will be automatically enrolled into the Default Lifestyle, unless you provide an investment instruction through the 'My Investments' section under 'My Pension'. You will need to ‘self-select’ your own investments from the choices available.
Lifestyle Strategies There are three lifestyle options available, these are comprised of blended funds.
Default Lifestyle In this profile, at your Target Retirement Date (TRD), your fund will be invested in the Handelsbanken Employee Retirement Focus (Default) Fund. This is appropriate as the default lifestyle as it has been designed for the average pension scheme member using industry data on how members have taken their benefits at retirement. The default lifestyle will continue investing for growth in retirement and may be particularly desirable where, for example, savings are going to be taken in several lump sums over a longer period of time into retirement or transferred into a drawdown product for investment during your retirement.
Members’ savings are invested entirely in the Handelsbanken Employee Long Term Strategy Fund until 30 years prior to retirement. From that point, new contributions and existing savings are gradually invested over a period of 5 years into the Handelsbanken Employee Balanced Strategy Fund, where they remain wholly invested until 15 years prior to retirement. Between 15 and 10 years from retirement, investments are gradually switched into the Handelsbanken Employee Cautious Strategy Fund where they remain until 5 years prior to retirement, when the investments are switched into the Handelsbanken Employee Retirement Focus (Default) Fund.
Annuity Focused Lifestyle Members may still choose to purchase an annuity when they retire as this may provide a secure guaranteed annual income for the rest of their and their dependent’s lives. The annuity lifestyle strategy invests in a fund which seeks to move in a similar way to annuity prices near retirement, the Handelsbanken Employee Retirement Focus (Annuity) Fund.
Cash Lifestyle This profile will have your entire fund invested in the Retirement Focus (Cash) Fund at your TRD. This protects savings against falls in value just before retirement and would be most appropriate for members who wish to wholly encash their savings at retirement for a lump sum (25% of which would be tax free under current legislation) or take a series of cash sums shortly after retiring.
To find out more about blended funds or the underlying funds within the default and alternative lifestyle options you can read the full investment booklet which is linked at the top of the page.
As an alternative to selecting a lifestyle strategy, members can instead invest directly in the Scheme’s funds. This gives access to the investments available in the lifestyling strategies along with several which are not, and it means members can determine how their savings are invested in the Scheme, and in what proportions.
If you select your own investments instead of choosing a lifestyle strategy, your investment choice is often referred to as “Self-Select”.
You can choose to invest your ongoing contributions in a different way from your existing savings if you wish using Self-Select. However, you cannot combine a lifestyle strategy with Self-Select.
The following table sets out the funds that are available, along with their objectives and the relevant fees.
To view the relevant fact sheets, please click on the Fund name.
The first four funds are responsible funds: Read about the responsible funds we offer.
Fund name
Description and investment target
Ongoing charges (TER)
Handelsbanken Growth Responsible Multi Asset Fund View the factsheet for this fund
The fund aims to grow your investment over the long term (five years or more) through a combination of income and capital growth after all costs and charges have been taken. The fund aims to deliver this return with a growth risk profile. There is no guarantee that the objective will be met or that a positive return will be delivered over any time period and capital is at risk.
0.81%
Handelsbanken Balanced Responsible Multi Asset Fund View the factsheet for this fund
The fund aims to grow your investment over the long term (five years or more) through a combination of income and capital growth after all costs and charges have been taken. The fund aims to deliver this return with a balanced risk profile. There is no guarantee that the objective will be met or that a positive return will be delivered over any time period and capital is at risk.
0.79%
Handelsbanken Cautious Responsible Multi Asset Fund View the factsheet for this fund
The fund aims to grow your investment over the long term (five years or more) through a combination of income and capital growth after all costs and charges have been taken. The fund aims to deliver this return with a cautious risk profile. There is no guarantee that the objective will be met or that a positive return will be delivered over any time period and capital is at risk.
0.78%
Handelsbanken Defensive Responsible Multi Asset Fund View the factsheet for this fund
The fund aims to grow your investment over the long term (five years or more) through a combination of income and capital growth after all costs and charges have been taken. The fund aims to deliver this return with a defensive risk profile. There is no guarantee that the objective will be met or that a positive return will be delivered over any time period and capital is at risk.
Handelsbanken Employee Global Equity Fund View the factsheet for this fund
The objective of this fund is to provide a return in line with global equity markets.
0.14%
Handelsbanken Employee Emerging Markets Equity Fund View the factsheet for this fund
The objective of this fund is to provide a return in line with emerging equity markets.
0.49%
Handelsbanken Employee Commercial Property Fund View the factsheet for this fund
The objective of this fund is to provide a return in line with commercial property markets.
0.67%
Handelsbanken Employee Fixed Annuity Focus Fund View the factsheet for this fund
The objective of this fund is to provide diversified exposure to sterling assets that reflect the broad characteristics of investments underlying the pricing of a typical level annuity product.
0.10%
Handelsbanken Employee Inflation Linked Annuity Focus Fund View the factsheet for this fund
The objective of this fund is to provide diversified exposure to sterling assets that reflect the broad characteristics of investments underlying the pricing of a typical inflation-linked annuity product.
Handelsbanken Employee Cash Fund View the factsheet for this fund
The objective of this fund is to provide a return in line with the short-term UK money market.
0.09%
Handelsbanken Islamic Global Equity Fund View the factsheet for this fund
The Fund aims to track as closely as possible the performance of the Dow Jones Islamic Market Titans 100 Index.
0.35%
Handelsbanken Global Equity ESG Fund View the factsheet for this fund
This fund aims to provide long-term capital growth through investment allocation to global equity securities which exhibit positive Environmental, Social and Governance characteristics.
0.16%
Notes: The Total Expense Ratio (TER) is the fund annual management charge (AMC) plus any additional expenses such as trading fees, legal fees, auditor fees and other operational expenses. This is taken automatically and is smoothed through the year on a daily basis. The TER figures shown above are as at 31 July 2023 and may change from time to time as the underlying funds within the blends change and/or those funds’ additional expenses change.
Charges are taken into account in the unit price for each fund and are deducted automatically by the managers. There can be other charges that members’ savings are subject to, for example, members may pay fees at retirement if they exercise certain options. These will be advised prior to the member committing to a course of action. All other fees relating to the Scheme are paid by the Bank.