World’s Biggest Pension Fund Posts Record $92 Billion Gain
The world’s biggest pension fund posted the biggest quarterly gain in its history as Japanese stocks surged and a plunge in the yen boosted overseas investments after Donald Trump’s election victory.
The Government Pension Investment Fund returned 8 percent, or 10.5 trillion yen ($92 billion), in the three months ended Dec. 31, increasing assets to 144.8 trillion yen, it said in Tokyo on Friday. Domestic equities added 4.6 trillion yen after the benchmark Topix index recorded its best quarterly performance since 2013, outweighing a loss on Japanese bond holdings. Foreign stocks and debt jumped as the yen fell the most against the dollar in more than two decades.
The Japanese retirement fund’s second straight quarterly gain is a welcome respite after it posted losses that wiped out all investment returns since overhauling its strategy in 2014 by buying more shares and cutting debt. GPIF, which has more than 80 percent of its stock investments in strategies that track indexes, benefits when broader equity markets are rising.
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