Super Fund 'on track' despite global crisis

The New Zealand Superannuation Fund is on track to meet its performance targets despite feeling the effects of the global financial crisis, an independent review has found.

The report, carried out by global consultancy firm Mercer, is the second undertaken since the fund was launched in 2003 in a bid to help pre-fund the future costs of retiring New Zealanders.

The reviews are designed to ensure the guardians of the fund are following best practice but this time around Finance Minister Bill English also requested greater emphasis be put on whether the fund was meeting its investment goals and performance targets.

In the May Budget English put a hold on contributions to the fund for up to 11 years, citing a lack of money in the Government's coffers.

Mercer chief executive Martin Lewington said it had not been told the reasons behind the focus on performance but assumed it was because of the global financial crisis.

"When you do get a shock or crisis, you do think whoa, does this make sense? Are we on track?"

The $15.3 billion Super Fund's investment returns plummeted 22.14 per cent in the year to June hitting a low in February this year of $11.2 billion.

But since then it had regained much of the losses, bouncing back up 33 per cent since March.

Lewington said the fund appeared to be on track to beat its performance target of exceeding the return on 90-day Treasury bills plus 2.5 per cent over rolling 20-year periods.

"We think there is a really high probability they will exceed that over the 20-year period."

Lewington said he felt very confident in the ability of the fund to pre-fund New Zealand superannuation.

But the review did recommend the guardians set more medium-term targets.

"We are just making sure there are some road markers on the journey. If you spend all your time on short- or long-term goals its hard to know how you are going."

Lewington said the fund was still relatively young, it turned six this year, and had gone through a huge growth spurt since it began investing in 2003. He said the fund needed to ensure it had the right management structure and he believed it did.

The report also recommended the guardians consider the cost of keeping some of its tasks in-house or outsourcing them.

In the last year the fund has taken a number of its New Zealand investment mandates in-house.

Lewington said outsourcing was a business model preferred by some but keeping functions in-house was fine as long as the organisation had sufficient capacity to handle them.

The review made 29 recommendations but Lewington said there was nothing in particular which stood out as needing improvement.

"New Zealand is lucky to have a fund like the Super Fund. Other sovereign wealth funds look at what the New Zealand Super Fund is doing as best practice."

Super Fund chairman David May and chief executive Adrian Orr said they saw the review as overall being supportive of the Guardians' governance and management of the fund.

"It was useful to talk through various investment issues with independent experts such as Mercer and to receive their encouragement," Orr said.