NETHERLANDS – The €4bn industry-wide scheme PNO Media saw its year-to-date result increase to 12.1% on the back of a quarterly return of 3.9%.

The quarterly performance, in combination with the effect of the new discount rate (UFR), pushed the scheme's funding up by 6.5 percentage points to 95.3%.

However, the pension fund also needed to factor in new longevity estimates, which it estimated could lower its coverage ratio by 1.6 percentage points.

Because the scheme's recovery plan prescribes a funding of 100.2% at year-end, it said the already announced maximum rights cut of 5.9% on 1 April 2013 was likely to be implemented.

It added that a second cut – at the end of 2013 – might be inevitable if the scheme fails to achieve the required coverage of 104.2% at the end of 2013.

Equity and fixed income returned 6.3% and 3.8%, respectively, during the third quarter, generating 15.9% and 9.6% year to date.

Among the best performing asset classes year to date were private equity, emerging market bonds and credits, returning 11.9%, 15.5% and 10.7%.

It further indicated that property and local currency-denominated emerging market bonds performed negatively over the period, resulting in losses of 1.1% and 3.8%, respectively.

PNO Media implements pension arrangements for 16,500 active participants, 23,000 deferred members and 8,000 pensioners, affiliated with 500 employers.

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