Sovereign Wealth Funds – the Financial Muscle to Influence Corporates and Economies
Sovereign Wealth Funds – The financial muscle to influence corporates and economies
Sovereign Wealth Funds – The financial muscle to influence corporates and economies
Overview:
Sovereign wealth funds (SWF) carry a great significance for both the big economies like like US, UAE, China, and the corporate world (including private equity, hedge fund) like Citigroup, UBS, Blackstone, AIG. SWFs have emerged as one of the most controversial issues in international finance – both politicians and the press have expressed concern about their activities. American Congressmen and the German Chancellor propose sharp surveillance, and possible restrictions on capital inflows from this particular source. Similarly Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president considers SWF “extremely aggressive” and he has promised to protect French managers from these funds. But not many corporates have complained, instead some like Barclays and Blackstone have welcomed funds from SWF..
Before we move ahead let us know what are SWFs. These are special purpose public investment funds, or arrangements. These funds are owned or controlled by the govt. The funds are commonly established out of official foreign currency operations, the proceeds of privatizations, fiscal surpluses, and/or receipts resulting from commodity exports. These funds employ a set of investment strategies which include investments in foreign financial assets for medium- to long-term macroeconomic and financial objectives. By contrast, pension funds have well-identified liabilities that constrain their investment policies and horizons. Investment vehicles like hedge funds and private equity firms are privately owned and therefore subject to the control of their owners. Hedge funds are often opaque but, unlike SWFs, tend to be highly leveraged and so a different set of issues such as counterparty risk are present
They are not a recent invention – Kuwait created the first modern fund in 1953. Close to half of the top 40 SWFs have been created since 2000. In the recent past Saudi Arabia, Russia and China created large funds.
Two kind of governments are pumping money into SWFs:
Commodity exporters (majority oil producers)
Countries running fiscal and trade surpluses
Oil economies have created the largest SWFs. Here is the list of top 5 SWFs
Country
Fund
Assets $ Bn
Start
Origin
UAE
Abu Dhabi Investment Authority
875875
1976
Oil
Norway
Government Pension Fund of Norway
391391
1990
Oil
Singapore
Government of Singapore Investment Corp
330330
1981
Non-commodity
Kuwait
Kuwait Investment Authority
264264
1953
Oil
China
China Investment Corp
200200
2007
Non-commodity
Oman’s SWF is named as State General Reserve Fund, established in 1980. Its fund size is estimated to be $ 6 billions
Distribution of the SWFs
(Source: The Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute)
Support to the economy
SWFs offer various economic and financial benefits. In their home countries, they
facilitate the saving and intergenerational transfer of proceeds from nonrenewable resources and help reduce boom and bust cycles driven by changes in commodity export prices. They also allow for a greater portfolio diversification and focus on return than traditionally is the case for central-bank-managed reserve assets, thereby potentially reducing (or eliminating) the opportunity costs of reserves holdings. For economies with plentiful foreign reserve assets, greater and prudent diversification reflects sound and responsible asset management.
There are multiple incentives to create a SWFs especially for oil producing economies. These economies want to create assets that ensure a long-term stream of revenue to cushion themselves against the roller coaster of commodity booms and busts. As many economists have observed, these countries are simply converting assets extracted from the earth into a more liquid form. Also, many of these governments are trying to build up reserve funds for the day when all of the oil is extracted from below ground.
Other economies which are export oriented like China are also using SWFs to keep their currencies fixed at a low par value.
Wealth managed
In early 2008, the estimated assets of the ten largest SWFs exceeded USD 3 trillion compared with USD 500 billion at the start of the 1990s. This is more than the value of all private equity or hedge funds
Chart comparing asset under management
(Source: Morgan Stanley report February