But, according to report from Aon Consulting, the news is not as bad as it could be, because only three weeks ago deficits had hit a three-year high of £73 billion.
Companies either submit their pension accounts at the end of March or at the end of December, and those that recorded in December were not disadvantaged by recent dramatic swings, such as the Government's quantitative easing initiative, implemented in early March, which caused lower bond yields, in turn leading to higher liabilities and deficits.
Sarah Abraham, consultant and actuary at Aon Consulting, said: "Pensions accounting has become a lottery based on a company's choice of accounting date. While there is always an element of luck as to how the deficit will look at the reporting date, this has been exacerbated by recent asset volatility.
"Unfortunately, the effect of quantitative easing loaded the odds against employers who were reporting at the end of March. There will, however, be some form of comfort that the year-end did not fall three weeks earlier when losses could have been as high as £80 billion."
Quantitative easing leads to record pension defecit recordings
UK companies recorded an aggregate pension deficit of 36 billion yesterday - marking a drop of 46 billion from the 10 billion pension surplus at the end of March 2009.
