2020 – a year of silver linings

It’s easy to get sucked into the doom and gloom narrative of 2020 – but I’d like to look at the positives of this year like no other. It’s been a year when we’ve learnt we don’t need to be in the office to be highly effective. A year where businesses have adapted and grown. A year when we discovered there is a real alternative to the grind of the daily commute – and work attire can be a t-shirt and jeans.

Mobius Life entered 2020 with around £20 billion of assets under administration. Not bad for a business that had just £5 billion in 2014. Yes, the figure slipped back a little as markets responded to the shock of COVID, but with new business wins from DB and DC schemes and a healthy pick up in market performance we’re ending 2020 with over £23 billion.

We responded quickly to the initial shock of lockdown. Our highly efficient core technology meant we could quickly move to a remote working model, effectively supporting our pension scheme clients and their consultants to navigate the choppy waters. All our staff have been working from home since March and our business model meant we could deliver a seamless and unbroken service to our clients throughout.

Like many businesses, we’ve learnt the new etiquette of remote working, Microsoft Teams and Zoom have meant we can stay in touch with colleagues and clients. Remembering when to mute and unmute and not forgetting people can see what you’re doing on video all the time has led to some interesting moments - but it’s meant we can stay in touch, collaborate and work effectively.

We’ve also responded to the emerging needs of our clients, working with asset managers to create new funds and launching new services for our clients.

We have launched new-style true index funds, income paying funds and structured equity funds. We have rolled out our specialist fund range to allow schemes of all sizes access to sophisticated investment strategies. We have also developed an ESG reporting service to help our clients complete their annual implementation statements.

In addition to this, we have helped our clients stay on target with the introduction of our smart rebalancing service.

This automates the rebalancing process for pension schemes, reducing risk and potential transaction costs.

Overall 2020 has been a good year for Mobius Life – enabling us to provide even more effective services to our clients. And to cap it all, we won the Professional Pensions Institutional Investment platform of the Year award – for a second year running.

Let’s look forward to 2021, with the promise of a vaccine and a return to greater normality but at the same time, let’s all take pride in what we achieved together in 2020.

Have a great Christmas everyone.