Pension Fund drained by 2031, report predicts

The Macau Pension Fund will not be able to cover its expenses by 2031, according to the Legislative Assembly’s (AL) Follow- up Committee on Public Finance Affairs.

The government has disclosed that it would invest in the retirement fund system in order to ensure the fund’s continued operation.

As at the end of 2017, the fund included 9,416 working members and 3,533 retirees, with cumulative total expenditures including pensions and other subsidies estimated at MOP1.766 billion.

Some 5,095 civil servants are expected to meet the retirement pension requirements by 2027, with their regular retirement pensions predicted to amount to up to MOP6.2 billion.

At the end of last year, the total financial assets were MOP16.774 billion, of which approximately 77 percent were allocated to the international portfolio, with the remaining funds allocated to the deposit portfolio. The annual return is 9.65 percent, amounting to MOP14.93 billion.

The fund owns a collection of 84 Japanese art pieces valued at MOP13.7 million. The collection, which includes pieces that date back to the 18th and 19th centuries, features works by Japanese artists Katsushika Hokusai, Kitagawa Utamaro, Suzuki Harunobu, and Ando Hiroshige. According to the report, as well as information provided by the Fund, the art collection was acquired in the late 1980s by the Portuguese administration, and has since been kept in the safe of the Banco Nacional Ultramarino. A highlight of the collection is a set of 46 prints from Hokusai, including “The Great Wave off Kanagawa,” a world-famous woodblock print by the Japanese ukiyo-e art movement period artist. The fund also owns a real estate property in Lisbon valued at MOP9.6 million.