Sovereign Wealth Funds

Best Sovereign Wealth Fund sites
Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs) are state owned investment funds that invest in a wide range of securities and assets, such as equities, bonds, commodities such as precious metals, property, land and direct ownership of companies. The funds at the disposal of a sovereign wealth fund are usually gained from the foreign exchange reserves of a country but can be derived from other sources such as oil export revenues or from pension contributions of state employees or budget surpluses of the central government. The funds of a SWF are typically distinct from the foreign exchange reserves of a central bank which are usually held in low yielding US, Euro, Sterling, Yen or Swiss Franc Treasury bonds. While the mandate of Sovereign Wealth Funds will vary from country to country, the basic idea is that a SWF will attempt to achieve significantly better returns than holding assets purely in low yielding Treasury bonds over the longer term. Although Sovereign Wealth Funds have been around since the early 1950s the actual term Sovereign Wealth Fund is a relatively new term dating from an article by Andrew Rozanov in 2005 entitled, "Who holds the wealth of nations?" in the Central Banking Journal. The first SWF was the Kuwait Investment Office which was set up in 1953 to manage the oil revenues of Kuwait. Since the year 2000 the number of SWFs has increased dramatically and there are now over 70 in existence. The size of SWFs varies greatly, with the largest fund the Norweigan Government Pension Fund having over $700 billion in assets, China currently has two funds; the SAFE investment company (State Administration of Foreign Exchange) with some $550 billion of funds and the China Investment Corporation with some $500 billion of funds. There are also SWFs with assets well below $1 billion such as Vietnams State Investment Corporation with $0.5 billion of assets. The Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute has a list of all the major SWFs 
link. As at May 2013 the total global assets of SWFs was estimated to be in the region of $5.4 trillion.
 
Best Sovereign Wealth Fund Sites
 

SWFinstitute.org
The Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute monitors SWFs. The fund rankings section shows the assets under management and both the large and smaller SWFs. There is a mixture of free and pay for material. 

IFSWF.org
The international forum for Sovereign Wealth Funds  is a voluntary group of Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs), which will meet, exchange views on issues of common interest, and facilitate an understanding of the Santiago
Principles and SWF activities. The presentations and speeches are a good way to keep abreast of developments.
 
FT.com/sovereignfunds
The Financial Times Sovereign Wealth Fund section has the latest news, comment and analysis. There are also accompanying videos.
 
Sovereignwealthfundsnews.com
This website brings the latest news on SWFs. In addition there is a useful glossary along with frequently asked questions. The news comes from various well known news sources such a the FT, Bloomberg, Wall Street Journal etc
 
Fletcher.tufts.edu/SWFI
The Fetcher School at Tufts University has established the Sovereign Wealth Fund initiative which publishes research on SWFs. There are downloadable papers and fund profiles. As well as news and a bulletin.
 
Globalcustodian.com/SWFs
Global Custodian Directory of Sovereign Wealth Funds is a searchable database listing state-owned investment funds composed of financial assets such as stocks, bonds, property or other financial instruments.
 
Preqin.com
You need to pay but has coverage and reports on sovereign wealth funds.
 
SovereignWealthCenter.com
This site covers over 90 seoveriegn wealth funds. We particularly like the fund profiles. In addition there is up to date news and analysis of the sector.
 
imf.org/sovereign-wealth-funds
The International Monetary Fund has a blog section relating to sovereign wealth funds.

 

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