Hundreds Of Romanians Are Shareholders Of BMW, Mercedes, Orange, Louis Vuitton Without Knowing It

05.05.2011 ZF English

Eight out of the nine privately-managed mandatory pension funds (2nd pillar) have for the first time since their launch published a detailed structure of their investments.

The over 4 million Romanians who contribute 3% of their gross monthly income to one of the eight funds have thus found out after three years that they finance, without their knowledge, UK banks or car manufacturers in Germany.

The eight funds invested around 130 million lei (EUR31.6 million) in foreign shares, such as those of BMW, Daimler and Louis Vuitton and a further RON308 million in corporate bonds, such as those issued by UK banks Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds and the Bank of Ireland.

Investments of the eight funds on the Bucharest Stock Exchange amounted to RON300 million, with the biggest investments targeting the five regional investment funds SIFs, OMV Petrom (SNP.RO) and BRD-Groupe Societe Generale (BRD.RO), while investments in bonds issued by Romanian companies amounted to RON50 million. Two thirds of the cumulated assets of the eight funds, i.e. around RON2.2 billion, are invested in Romanian T-bills.

The funds' investments in shares make the difference in terms of yield and implicitly in terms of to the pension that contributors to these pension schemes will receive in 20 years' time. (EUR1=RON4.1127)

Keywords:: PRIVATE PENSIONS; , FUNDS; , INVESTMENTS

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