Voluntary pension funds start to diversify investments

Voluntary private pension funds (pillar III) have started to diversify their portfolios, purchasing government bonds, fund units in mutual funds and even shyly buying shares listed on the stock exchange, according to the data published by the Private Pension System Supervision Commission (CSSPP).
Thus, the around 5m euro assets voluntary pension funds held late last year were 21% placed in government bonds, 7% in mutual funds, minor percentages in shares and 70% in deposits.
The share of money kept in deposits dropped from 90% in October 2007 to 70% in December, according to CSSPP data, as funds started to diversify their investments.
By law, each voluntary pension fund is allowed to keep its assets in banking deposits until the value of the net total asset reaches 1m RON. Beyond this threshold, each fund has 90 days to diversify its investments and head towards the target-portfolio stipulated in the prospectus.
According to the data valid on February 9 (the latest data), 6 of the 7 funds operating on the market of voluntary pensions exceeded the 1m-RON threshold and will soon have to diversify their portfolios at the maximum as they promised to their customers in the fund issue prospectuses.
For the time being, the only fund forced to bring its portfolio close to the targeted one is AZT Moderato (managed by Allianz-Tiriac Pensii Private), which is in fact the first to have gone beyond the 1m RON threshold in terms of assets, last October. The last fund that overshot the mark was Pensia mea, managed by Aviva.
Four of the six funds bound to diversify their portfolios have a medium-risk profile, investing around 20-30% of assets in listed shares. One of them, AZT Vivace, has a high-risk profile, investing up to 45% in shares, mutual funds and other variable income instruments, and the other one, BCR Prudent, managed by BCR Asigurari de Viata, has a low-risk profile, investing 10% at the most in shares and bonds. As the funds go through the 90 days during which they have to diversify their investments, placements in stock and mutual funds will grow.
According to the prospectuses, the largest part of these funds’ assets will be invested in fixed-income financial instruments, namely T-bills and bonds.
According to CSSPP’s latest data, the biggest company on the market in terms of the number of customers is Allianz-Tiriac Pensii Private (15,500). ING Asigurari de Viata ranks second with ING Clasic (9,400 customers) and ING Optim (5,200). Next come BCR Asigurari de Viata with BCR Prudent fund (over 11,500 customers), Aviva (Pensia mea – 5,300 customers) and OTP Garancia (OTP Strateg – 264 customers). The total number of voluntary pension fund participants revolves around 60,500.