Pension Fund Assets hit N10 trillion in November
The pension fund assets as of November 30 were valued at N9.992 trillion, which is about N8 billion away from N10 trillion mark. This detail is contained in a report by the National Pension Commission, www.pension.gov.ng, for the month of November, 2019.
On its website, the Pencom October 2019 report placed total pension assets at N9.811 trillion. Of the total sum, 70.43% was invested in federal government securities. However, the breakdown of the November figure shows that Federal Government securities largely accounted for 70.88% of the total assets.
This translates to N7.082 trillion. From this, 48.63% or N4.858 trillion, was invested in government bonds, while 21.21% or N2.119 trillion, was channeled into Treasury bills. Part of the fund was allocated for investment in agencies bonds, both the Nigerian Mortgage Refinance Company (NMRC) and Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria (FMBN) accounted for N10.821 billion.
Then, Sukuk and Green bonds, as well as States government securities,. In the assets class, corporate debt attracted 6.4% or N639.811 billion while local money market grabbed 11.73% which translates to N1.171 trillion. Meanwhile, investment in mutual funds accounted for just 0.24% of the pension fund’s assets in November.
After successful pension reform in 2014, the fund has jumped by about 120% in five years, though experts say huge informal sector is largely a threat to the retirement plan in Nigeria. It would be recalled that, as at June 2014, total pension assets was N4.5 trillion.
Following the introduction of the ‘multi-funds structure’ regulation, analysts stated that it expect to see greater market risk in pension funds as their asset allocations change.
The pension regulation aims to align pension investments with the age and risk appetite of retirement savings account (RSA) members by creating three new RSA funds (formerly one) for active contributors. #Pension Fund Assets hit N10 trillion in November
By Gbenga Anisere
