Whisky Galore

Happen to know of a pension plan, public or corporate, that's not underfunded? Give the remarkable rarity an encouraging hug.

In the U.K., the WSJ reports, such companies as Sainsbury and Marks & Spencer are resorting to "property assets" to plump up their pension funds. Diageo, the world's largest whisky producer, is using millions of barrels of maturing whisky.

The Financial Times hails Diageo's clever move:

Like the 1940s film Whisky Galore – in which Scottish islanders find a treasure of whisky from a shipwreck, helping to improve the mood on their remote island – Diageo has also discovered that its own whisky assets can ease the corporate anxiety of yawning pension hole.

If you have never seen that classic Ealing comedy, check it out. In this country the film was retitled "Tight Little Island."