Andrew Evans and Will Wynne

As perceptions of retirement shift across the world, in line with emerging technology and reforms to legislation, the industry needs to keep up and remain one step ahead. At Smart, we’re continuing to lead the way in research and development in this space, and as part of our mission, we’ll continue to share some of the insights we gain around the needs of savers across the world.

In 2021, we launched our first ‘Future of Global Retirement’ report, taking you through findings from more than 6,000 savers across the UK, Australia and the US, discussing their knowledge, attitudes and concerns about retirement saving. This year we look at how some of these trends are progressing, with the inclusion of South Africa, a region on the cusp of pension reform with the aim of decreasing poverty amongst its ageing population.

In 2022 we celebrated the important milestone of reaching a million savers who are now benefiting from Smart’s technology in our Smart Pension Master Trust. And at the beginning of 2023, Smart has exceeded £5 billion in Assets Under Management (AUM) on its proprietary Keystone platform. These are incredible achievements and represent our commitment to transform retirement savings for the better.

As we enter 2023, we bring you our latest Future of Global Retirement report. Understanding people’s behaviours and attitudes to saving for later life, helps us to make sure that our platform is constantly evolving to keep savers and technology at the forefront of everything that we do.

As before, we want to share this information with a view to serving our mission: to transform retirement, savings and financial wellbeing, across all generations, around the world.

This year’s report includes findings from more than 8,000 savers across the UK, Australia, South Africa and the US. Although the retirement landscape in each of these regions differs vastly, we have identified some common trends. Men and women have different perceptions of decumulation (the process of converting pension savings to retirement income), there are shared concerns around being able to afford basic living costs in retirement and an increasing desire for transparency, flexibility and online access to retirement savings. We hope that shedding light on these concerns and preferences will continue to shape the retirement landscape for the better through technological solutions that have savers’ wellbeing at their core.

Thank you.