Norway’s finance minister set out his 2025 budget this week, which included a larger spend from the country’s sovereign wealth fund. In absolute terms, the amount has increased for the third time in three years – even taking account of inflation.
On the other hand, the government is keeping well within the budgetary rule for dipping into the Government Pension Fund Global (GPFG) to pay for public spending, with the proposal to take 2.5% from the SWF next year – below the rule’s 3% limit.
Denmark’s ATP has handed companies in its investment portfolio more specific guidance as they prepare for new rules coming in next year under the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), obliging large businesses to include sustainability data in their annual reports.
The statutory pensions giant told the Danish firms which datapoints it actually wants them to report on – and issued a warning that the EU’s sustainability rules could lead to over-reporting.
Meanwhile, more criticism about the way Denmark’s mandatory labour-market pension scheme works has emerged, calling for policy makers to make several changes – including stopping ATP from acting as the investor of the schemes assets, instead putting that business out to tender.
“ATP is a relic of the past and does not suit today’s pension system,” said Danish right-leaning free-market think tank CEPOS in a new reform plan for ATP.
In Sweden, the Pensions Agency (Pensionsmyndigheten) appears likely to be accused of rule-breaking regarding its poor investment in residential firm Heimstaden Bostad, after the country’s Financial Supervisory Authority (Finansinspektionen) escalated its investigation into the matter to a sanction case.
The FSA is also facing a delicate situation in its handling of the case, because its director general Daniel Barr was heading up the Pensions Agency at the time the investment in Heimstaden Bostad was made. Barr has excused himself from involvement in the FSA’s sanction case.
Items to note:
- Nicolai Tangen, the CEO of Norway’s GPFG, said in an interview with Swedish national radio that the NOK18.8trn (€1.6trn) oil fund wanted US electric car giant Tesla to sign a collective agreement with workers in Sweden. Tesla has been in a long conflict with with the Swedish trade union IF Metall over the issue.
- IPE Real Estate is holding its Global Conference & Awards 2025 event on 22 May in Copenhagen next year. The annual event for institutional investors, such as pension funds, is now in its 21st year.
Rachel Fixsen
Nordic Correspondent
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