Apple TV’s latest show Steal places the UK pensions industry at the centre of a high-stakes drama, built around the theft of £4bn of members’ savings from a “fiduciary pension fund manager”. It is not often that trustees and investment governance make prime-time television, so curiosity alone makes it worth a watch.

What is surprising is that the portrayal of pension investment is more thoughtful than expected. The producers have clearly spent time in understanding how the industry operates. That said, realism inevitably competes with the need to keep viewers engaged - and a few elements from the first episode illustrate where creative licence clearly begins to take over.

To kick things off, the familiar “pensions are boring” joke appears early on - everyone in the industry will be used to this one. It is a well-worn trope, deployed in contrast with the drama that follows so works well in the context, yet anyone working in pensions knows the opposite is true. The variety of issues trustees (for example) navigate - from funding strategy to ESG considerations, member cases and regulatory change - makes for complex, engaging and important work.

More implausible is the idea that £4bn was conveniently sitting in cash, ready to be stolen at a moment's notice. In reality, pension assets are carefully diversified across asset classes, with liquidity, collateral and out-of-market exposure tightly managed. The notion of such a sum lying idle in a cash account stretches the credibility of the show. However, we all know that television relies on instant gratification for viewings - waiting for asset sales and settlement cycles would not make for compelling viewing.

But the swift approval of the transfer by a custodian is perhaps the biggest dramatic leap. In practice, segregation of duties, multiple signatories, independent oversight and strict authorisation protocols exist precisely to prevent this type of event. The governance framework surrounding pension assets is layered and deliberate - by design.

While the central premise is fictional, Steal does prompt reflection on real-world pension risk. The most significant historic example in the UK remains Robert Maxwell’s appropriation of the Mirror Group pension schemes in the early 1990s, involving around £500m. That incident combined weaker regulation, concentrated power and failures of oversight over an extended period.

And what does the risk landscape look like today, in real life? The most credible threats are not dramatic heists, but cybercrime, compromised credentials and increasingly sophisticated social engineering. As a result, cyber risk now sits high on trustee and administrator risk registers across the industry.

Ultimately, while Steal heightens reality for entertainment, it underscores an important truth - safeguarding members’ benefits depends on strong governance, robust controls and constant vigilance. These may not make for gripping television, but they remain the foundation of trust in the pensions system. But, if those were the sole focus of the storyline, it is fair to speculate that the viewing figures might be lower.

---