Conservative overweighting hinders world’s largest investor

An overweight allocation to domestic bonds has not helped the world’s largest investor in the June quarter, with a massive $42 billion shaved off the assets of the ¥116,802 billion ($1.37 trillion), Government Pension Investment Fund of Japan (GPIF).

The fund’s ¥10 trillion exposure to international equities was the main contributor to the negative performance, with that asset class returning -17.43 per cent. Domestic stocks, also underperformed with a -13.93 per cent return for the quarter.

The GPIF has a 72 per cent allocation to domestic bonds, up slightly from the year before, and above its target position of 67 per cent. It also has another 8 per cent in international bonds.

The fund has allocations of 10.87 per cent in domestic equities and 9.11 per cent in international equities, and is most underweight in short-term assets, where its target is 5 per cent, and its allocation is short of 1 per cent.

Last financial year, ending March 31, international equities were the main positive contributor to performance, with a massive 46.11 per cent. The total fund return for the year was 7.9 per cent

Most of the assets are managed passively, and last financial year (ending March 31, it reduced its weighting to actively managed international equities, widening the number of service providers at the same time.

Sponsored Content

Overall the fund employs more than 80 funds managers.

One response to “Conservative overweighting hinders world’s largest investor”

Leave a Comment

Sort content by

Quality factor explained by profitability: Robert Novy-Marx

Among academic classifications, and the subsequent implementation of factor investing, “quality” is one of the newer areas of investigation. Robert Novy-Marx, the Lori and Alan S. Zekelman Professor of Finance at the University of Rochester, is leading the charge on the academic justification of quality as a factor, although he has a “jaded scepticism” about

How to allocate assets to combat climate risk

  Mercer’s extensive climate change report, launched today, gives investors a practical framework for monitoring and managing climate risk, shifting the discussion from philosophical agreement to practical investment implementation.   In Investing in a time of climate change Mercer outlines extensive dynamic investment modelling that analyses changes in the return expectations of assets between 2015

Behind Norway’s coal divestment

The Norwegian Parliament’s finance committee recommendations to direct the Government Pension Fund Global to divest from companies that generate more than 30 per cent of their output or revenue from coal-related activities, is the evolution of a climate-related investment strategy that dates back to 2010. Amanda White explores the raft of tools the fund uses

CalPERS gives its managers ESG ultimatum

In what promises to be a transformational moment for ESG integration and investment manager accountability, CalPERS will require all of its managers to identify and articulate ESG in their investment processes. CalPERS staff led by Anne Simpson, senior portfolio manager and director of global governance, presented the ESG manager expectations, and draft sustainable investment guidelines,

Sourcing liquidity in fragmented markets

As equity trading becomes more fragmented, and more trading is done outside exchanges, it is prudent to assess whether alternative liquidity pools contribute to well-functioning markets. Norges Bank Investment Management has done the work for you, analysing the contributions, structures and functions of trading venues with limited pre-trade transparency. One of the benefits of liquidity

Factors the same in credit and equities

Robeco will launch the world’s first multi-factor credit fund, after academic research by its quantitative research team reveals that size, low-risk, value and momentum factors have economically meaningful and statistically significant risk-adjusted returns in the corporate bond market. David Blitz, co-head of quantitative strategies at Robeco in Rotterdam, tells Amanda White why an active approach makes

Previous