Lord Ashcroft transferred his £17m stake of his main UK company Impellam Group to a trust for his children on 5 April this year to avoid new tax rules.

Standard Life has developed its active money SIPP with a new investment team to assist high net worth clients and an enhanced property service.

The RDR poses a threat to the stream of communication between IFAs, small business owners and their employees on pension schemes, an employee benefits consultant warns.

Many SIPPs recommended by IFAs to clients are not true SIPPs, George Ladds, head of investment and pension research at Fair Investment Company claims.

Almost three-quarters of pensioners with pots of less than £40,000 do not use the open market option, according to research from Partnership.

Standard and Poor's(S&P) has downgraded pension provider Scottish Equitable and warned on the restructure of parent company Aegon.

Just over half of small firms support auto-enrolment but 53% say it will "add significantly to costs", the ACA says.

A new system of collecting data proposed by HMRC could mean pensioners never have to pay emergency tax rates again, according to Standard Life head of pensions policy John Lawson.

HMRC must remove its lifetime allowance on pension savings if an annual limit is introduced or risk discouraging retirement saving, Skandia says.

Trade unions in France began their second 24-hour strike last night in protest against President Sarkozy's plan to raise the retirement age from 60 to 62.