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- Norway’s $1.4 trillion sovereign wealth fund, the world’s largest, reported a loss of 374 billion crowns ($33.80 billion) in the third quarter of the year. This loss was attributed to declines in the value of equities and bonds.
- The fund’s return on investment for the July-September period was minus 2.1%, which was 0.17 percentage points stronger than its benchmark index.
- Equities, the largest asset class in the fund, accounting for 70.6% of its value, saw a 2.1% loss. Fixed income investments, representing just over a quarter of its assets, reported a loss of 2.2%, and real estate assets incurred a 3.3% loss.
- The broad-based nature of the decline in the fund’s performance was attributed to factors like rising interest rates and concerns about a concentration of growth in a few large U.S. tech companies.
- The fund’s exposure to the Israel-Hamas conflict is limited, with 0.1% of its investments held in Israel, equivalent to 20.4 billion crowns. The fund is monitoring the situation but has not changed its investment strategy in Israel.