The total pension assets in Nigeria rose to a record high of N17.93 trillion as of November 2023, an increase of 1.5 per cent from N17.66 trillion recorded as of the previous month.
According to the National Pension Commission (PenCom) the Nigerian pension asset increased by over N2.93 trillion between January and November 2023.
Meanwhile, most of the assets have been deployed in fixed-income securities, with about 66 per cent of the funds invested in FGN securities, specifically federal government bonds, which gulped about N11.25 trillion of the total assets, which is in line with the regulation of the PenCom for PFAs to be conservative with public funds.
Investments in the local bourse have however witnessed growth in recent times, on the back of the bullish performance of the Nigerian stock market in 2023, printing an annual return of 45.9 per cent.
Specifically, a total of N1.49 trillion was deployed in the local equities market, representing a 64 per cent increase compared to N908 billion recorded as of December 2022.
Further breakdown of the pension assets showed that N1.91 trillion was invested in corporate debt securities as of November 2023, while N1.55 trillion is currently deployed in money market instruments.
Also, a total of 101,820 Retirement Savings Account (RSA) holders switched their Pension Fund Administrators (PFA) in 2023, representing an increase of 10.2 per cent compared to the 92,413 transfers recorded in the previous year, and the highest on record.
Since the National Pension Commission (PenCom) reopened the transfer window in the fourth quarter of 2020, a total of 245,625 RSA holders have changed their pension administrators.
Similarly, a total of N462 billion was moved by the RSA holders in the review year, 28 per cent higher than the N361.5 billion that was transferred in the previous year, bringing the total since the inception of the transfer window to N1.14 trillion.
This transfer is in line with section 13 of the Pension Reform Act (PRA) 2024, which specifies that an RSA holder may transfer his/her account from one PFA to another.
This is done in a bid to improve efficiency in the industry by intensifying the level of competition among the administrators. This was also complimented by the recapitalization of the PFAs from N1 billion to N5 billion, which resulted in a series of mergers and acquisitions in the industry.
