Operators invest N250bn pension funds in real estate

Data from the National Pension Commission (PenCom) has revealed that pension operators in the country have invested the total sum of N250.02 billion pension assets in the country in real estate.

This figure translates to 2.68 per cent of the total assets of the Contributory Pension Scheme, which stood at N9.32tn as of the end of June 2019.

The operators had invested N229.17bn in real estate as of the end of 2018 from N203.35bn at the end of 2017.

According to the PenCom data, the operators had also invested substantial part of the pension funds in the Federal Government’s bonds, treasury bills and state governments’ securities.

Some of the funds, PenCom further disclosed were invested in agency bonds, supra-national bonds, commercial papers, foreign money market securities and open/close-end funds.

Read also: CBN pegs lending rate for banks, other financial institutions

Other investment portfolios, where the operators invested the funds are REITS, private equity funds, infrastructure funds, cash and other assets.

The acting Director-General, PenCom, Mrs Aisha Dahir-Umar, said the CPS had been impactful in Nigeria since the commencement of its implementation in 2004, adding that the formation of long-term domestic capital, which was in trillions of naira of pension assets, was slowly but surely changing Nigeria’s financial landscape.

According to her, this was also transforming the course and pace of the country’s socio-economic development, adding that about 73 per cent of the total pension assets had been invested in the Federal Government securities issued to finance various activities of the government.

“We believe that the enlistment of the informal sector into the pension savings net would boost the quantum of available long-term investible funds that would galvanise national development efforts,” she said.

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