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KiwiSaver fund managers shift their focus offshore, especially into overseas equities, as members raise their risk/reward profiles

Investing
KiwiSaver fund managers shift their focus offshore, especially into overseas equities, as members raise their risk/reward profiles

KiwiSaver members now have $17.2 billion invested in their schemes as at June 2013, data from the RBNZ reveals.

That represents 20% more per member than a year ago, from a combination of member contributions and investment returns.

The average KiwiSaver balance is now $8,013, up from $6,670 in June 2012.

The total funds invested grew more than 31% in one year, but membership grew at the same time by a bit over 9%.

(For comparison, the NZ Super Fund grew by 21.2% to $23.2 billion, although the government made no contributions. In KiwiSaver funds, members made regular contributions to the size of the fund.)

KiwiSaver fund managers have been progressively shifting these investments into overseas securities.

As at June 30, 2013, the overall components are now about 50:50, NZ and overseas. A year ago the ratio was 52:48. Five years ago, the ratio was 60:40, admittedly on a very small base because the KiwiSaver scheme had only just started.

The fastest growing allocation in the last year has been to overseas equities. More than $1.5 bln has been added to these investments, up 38% in a year.

Another big growth area has been NZ fixed income securities, up $838 million or more than 20% higher in one year.

Overseas fixed income and New Zealand cash deposits saw falling support by fund managers.

You can find how your fund is invested and how it performed over the past year, and more importantly over the past five years, here » and how it ranks against other funds here »

  June 2013 June 2012 change
  $ mil share $ mil share $ mil growth
Total KiwiSaver funds 17,203   13,117   4,086 31.2%
of which            
invested in NZ 8,682 50.5% 6,859 52.3% 1,823 26.6%
invested overseas 8,520 49.5% 6,257 47.7% 2,263 36.2%
             
NZ deposits 1,502 8.7% 1,324 10.1% 178 13.4%
NZ Govt securities 912 5.3% 676 5.2% 236 34.9%
NZ fixed income securities 4,105 23.9% 3,267 24.9% 838 25.7%
NZ equities 1,647 9.6% 1,239 9.4% 408 32.9%
NZ property 510 3.0% 348 2.7% 162 46.6%
Other NZ assets 6   5   1 20.0%
             
Overseas fixed income 2,771 16.1% 2,115 16.4% 616 28.6%
Overseas equities 5,512 32.0% 3,956 30.2% 1,556 39.3%
Other overseas assets 237 1.4% 146 1.1% 91 62.3%

Data sourced from RBNZ C15 release

New Zealand fund managers also have another $22.2 billion invested in non-KiwiSaver superannuation schemes, $40.2 billion invested in unit trusts, and $5.9 billion in life insurance funds. These other funds grew by +10.3% in the year to June 2013.

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5 Comments

(For comparison, the NZ Super Fund grew by 21.2% to $23.2 billion, although the government made no contributions.

 

The NZ Super Fund claims: Returns are measured on a 'time weighted' basis (monthly compounding). This is common practice when measuring investment managers' performance against benchmarks, as it eliminates the impact of cash flows

 

This is not the same as an IRR calculation and not the method employed by the Government Superannuation Fund - David I think you need to improve the veracity of the comparisons you are attempting to declare. 

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Stephen. All I am doing is observing that the lastest NZ Super Fund value is NZ$23.17 bln and this is 21.97% more than the NZ$18.996 bln it was a year earlier. Nothing more. That is the same basis I am observing the change in total values of KiwiSaver funds.

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Regardless, wait and watch this "growth" evaporate IF QE ever stops.

Ergophobia 

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One of the intended attributes of Kiwisaver is that as balances rise Kiwis will start to take more notice of investment issues.  And that seems to be happening in the media and here on Interest.co.   Take off point was said to be when balances reached the value of a good small car.  And thats about $8K.    Expect demand will grow for these articles David.

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Good point indeed. It will be great when we hear schoolgirls saying " Oh my God, did you see the price of Apple this morning, like that PE is like so like ......."

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