World’s Largest Pension Fund GPIF Now Holds Record $1.75 Trillion in Assets

Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund posted a fifth consecutive quarterly gain in its investments as returns from overseas assets helped make up for losses on domestic equities.

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The world’s biggest pension fund gained 2.7% for the quarter ended in June, boosting assets under management by 4.98 trillion yen ($45.4 billion) to a record 191.6 trillion yen, it announced on Friday. Overseas stocks were its best-performing investment, returning 8.6%, while domestic shares lost 0.3%. Foreign bonds added 1.9% and Japanese bonds gained 0.5%.

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Overseas stocks have been the GPIF’s top-performing asset since April of last year, when the fund started reducing its dependence on Japanese government bonds to focus on equities and foreign debt. Last month, the GPIF posted a record-breaking return for the fiscal year ended March.

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The gains announced Friday took the cumulative returns since the fund began managing the nation’s pension reserves in 2001 past 100 trillion yen, including interest and dividend income.

“The April-June quarter saw global equities rally on the back of expectations for Covid-19 vaccine rollout and economic reopening, as well as ongoing easy monetary policy by key countries,” said GPIF President Masataka Miyazono in a statement. “Domestically, Japanese equities slipped due to worries over resurgence of infections.”

Read more @Bloomberg

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