Despote Economic Crunch, Pension Fund Records N335.57bn Growth in Five Months 

Ebere Nwoji

Despite the general economic crunch plaguing businesses in the country,  the National Pension Commission (PenCom) has said that pension fund  recorded a monumental growth of N335.572 billion within the first five months of this year.

It added that the total pension asset accumulated by all the licensed Pension Fund Administrators (PFAs) stood at approximately N15.772 trillion.

This is contained in the unaudited financial report released by the commission which said the above figure was as at May 31,2023.

According to PenCom report, this showed  approximately  N15.582 billion growth from April figure of N15.582 trillion total assets.

It also shows that whereas the pension sector in the first five months of the year recorded N335.572 billion growth, in the first four months of the year that is April 30th 2023, the sector recorded approximately  N189.180bn growth.

In the month of March that is first quarter of the year, pension total assets stood at N15.45 trillion while the monthly growth rate recorded was N132.6 billion.

Giving a break down of  how the funds were invested, PenCom said the funds were invested in various asset classes, adding that as at May 31,2023, federal government securities still retained the lion share by having N910.97billion in the existing scheme, “with closed PFAs fund I taking N48,649.69, fund II; N4,482,533.69 while fund III took N3,232,851.53 fund IV took N876,975.24 while fund V took 166.89; whereas fund VI active fund took N2,425.65 bringing the total pension assets in the federal government securities to N10,435,225.58.”

PenCom said investments in federal government bonds has N866,532.45 remaining “with the existing scheme, N793,823.58 with closed PFAs, N46,083.71 in  fund I N4,325,344.66 in  fund II N3,116,530.36  fund III, N848,157.65 fund IV, N132.05 for  fund IV, N7,765.75 for fund VI Active and N1,112.98 for fund VI retiree.This is followed by investment in federal government treasury bills which stood at N 33,758.84 in existing scheme, N8,169.75 in closed PFAs.”

The commission said  fund I took N33,758.84Fund I I took N90,722.47, Fund III N47,148.26,  fund IV 30.18 fund V N30.18 while fund VI retiree took 19.56.Active took N381.66.

According to the PenCom unaudited report, investment in money market instrument shows that N232,085.93 is retained in the existing scheme, “closed  PFAs took N143,641.37 fund I  took N8,044.75 , fund II took N709,,959.58, fund III took N478,808.36, fund IV took N161,928.36, fund IV took N230.03 fund VI active took N9,096.14Fund 6 retiree took N1,444.05.”