CPF assets up 6.63% to $374.87b in 2018

It is ranked as the world's ninth largest pension fund.

The Central Provident Fund (CPF) defied the global decline after assets under management (AUM) rose 6.63% to $399.7b (US$286.96b) in 2018 from $374.87b (US$269.13b) in 2017, according to data from the Thinking Ahead Institute.

Thanks to its strong showing, the CPF retained its title as the 9th largest pension fund worldwide, trailing behind the pension funds of Japan, Norway, the US, South Korea, Netherlands,China and Canada but ahead of the Netherlands’ PFZW.

Singapore also saw the third fastest annualised growth rate in USD terms at 7.45% during the five-year period from 2013 to 2018, just behind India and China. In local currency terms, its annualised growth rate is at 9.11%.

Singapore holds 1.6% of the total AUM from the top 300 pension funds. The global value of the world’s largest pension funds hit $25.07t (US$18t) in 2018. It slipped 0.4% YoY, reversing the 15.1% climb in 2017. The AUM value of the top 20 funds also fell by 1.6%, equating to 40.7% of total AUM during the year, from 41.1% in 2017 in what marks the first year since 2012 that the funds’ share of the total went down.

North America remains the largest region in terms of AUM, accounting for 45.2% of all assets in the research, with an annualised growth rate of 5.8% from 2013 to 2018. Europe and Asia-Pacific AUM represent 24.9% and 26.2%, respectively, booking annualised growth rates at 0.5% and 5.2% in the same period.

Asia-Pacific funds’ share slid from 44.3% in 2017 to 43% in 2018, as regional funds’ assets on the top 20 declined by 4.4% during the year.