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MUSLIM

Sweden’s Sharia pension fund outperforms market

A Swedish pension fund that abides by Sharia laws has outperformed the Stockholm stock exchange since its launch in October.

Published: 5 December 2008 15:22 CET

The Sharia fund, a part of the Premium Pension Authority’s (PPM) fund system, was conceived to give Muslims a chance to have their retirement money grow without being placed in stocks which earned money by charging interest.

As such, the fund doesn’t invest in financial stocks and has thus avoided many of the losses suffered by other investors during the recent financial crisis.

Similar in many ways to other socially responsible investment funds, the Sharia fund also avoids investments in companies dealing in weapons, tobacco, alcohol, pornography, and pork, as well as firms which are highly indebted.

A council consisting of five imams regularly evaluates the fund’s investments to ensure it continues to abide by Sharia laws.

Over the last three months, the fund has performed better than the Stockholm stock exchange, dropping only 20 percent in value, compared to the 28 percent losses suffered by the OMX-index.

OIL

Norway’s wealth fund gains 38 billion euros in first quarter

Norway's sovereign wealth fund, the world's largest, gained some 38 billion euros (380 billion kroner) in the first quarter, boosted by stock market investments, it said Wednesday.

Published: 21 April 2021 13:28 CEST
Norway's wealth fund gains 38 billion euros in first quarter
Norway's wealth fund, which has been built up since the 1990s from the state's oil revenues.Photo by Jan-Rune Smenes Reite from Pexels

The massive fund, which has been built up since the 1990s from the state’s oil revenues, was worth a total of 11 trillion Norwegian kroner (1.1 trillion euros) at the end of March.

In the first quarter, it posted a four percent return, driven by its equity investments, which account for 73.1 percent of its portfolio and rose by 6.6 percent.

“The rise of the equity market was to a great extent driven by the finance and energy sector,” Trond Grande, the fund’s second in command, said in a statement.

The fund also made gains on its real estate investments, which account for 2.5 percent of its assets and were up 1.4 percent, while its fixed-income investments (nearly a quarter of the portfolio) suffered a 3.2 percent loss.

At the same time, the government dipped into its piggy bank to the tune of 83 billion kroner to balance its budget.

Recently the fund made its first direct investment in renewable energy infrastructure.

READ MORE: Norway wealth fund buys first renewable energy stake 

It announced it was purchasing a 50 percent stake in the world’s second-largest offshore wind farm, the Borssele 1 & 2 wind farms located off the coast of the Netherlands in the North Sea.

The 50 percent stake is being acquired from Danish firm Orsted, which will continue to own the remaining 50 percent of the project.

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