Korea hosted the International Pension Conference to discuss issues surrounding the world’s most influential investment funds from July 11-13.

The forum drew 37 heads of pension services worldwide who manage a total of 3,620 trillion won ($3.4 trillion) worth of assets.

Representatives from powerhouses including Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund, Canada’s Canada Pension Plan Investment and Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan took part in the meeting, the first of its kind in Korea.

At the meeting, top pension managers made predictions about the global economy and also offered recommendations on future investments. They said the global economic downturn in 2008 did not affect their asset allocation strategies.

They said emerging countries, which are expected to lead the next wave of economic growth, are in the spotlight as the most hopeful real estate investment targets, followed by northern American states. They predicted global stock markets to be stronger in the latter half of this year, and said they would increase the portion of alternative investments in mostly energy and consumer goods.

They noted that the reeling Euro zone would have a negative effect on economic recovery in the short term.
 

“Managers of the pension funds with 40 years of history discussed various ways to develop new investment models, global finance and economy and alternatives to enhance each fund’s global competitiveness, not to mention understanding each other,” Jun Kwang-woo, chairman and CEO of the National Pension Service, told The Korea Herald.

“It was time for the Korean national pension to diversify its investment models. The meeting was a booster. We have held bilateral meetings with the Japan’s GPIF and Canada’s CPPIB to discuss information exchanges and cooperation in future investments,” Jun said.

He emphasized that the NPS has recently secured more than 19.5 million subscribers and that the NPS fund has become the world’s fourth-largest pension fund in terms of total assets.

He stressed the importance of global competitiveness.

“In June, we opened a New York branch to boost NPS status in the overseas market and stabilize risk management as well as strengthen our fund and other management abilities. It will also play a stepping stone to establish more overseas branches, for example, in London, Hong Kong and more,” he added.
By Bae Ji-sook (baejisook@heraldcorp.com)