Sovereign wealth fund stung by markets
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China's massive sovereign wealth fund announced Tuesday a 10 pecent mark-to-market loss and said it was waiting for fresh money from the government, the Wall Street Journal reported.
"In May and June, because of the volatility of the US and European markets, we had about 10 percent mark-to-market losses," Jesse Wang, executive vice president and chief risk officer of China Investment Corporation, said at an event in San Francisco.
China Investment Corporation (CIC), also known as China's sovereign wealth fund, manages nearly $300 billion in foreign exchanges.
According to its annual report, the fund gained 11 percent in 2009. "But this year will be tough," Wang said. "CIC plans to turn to the central government for more monetary injections."
Local media said the 10 percent plunge is equivalent to $1 billion. CIC was not immediately available for comment.
CIC, one of the world's largest sovereign wealth funds, was established in 2007 with ap-proximately $200 billion in assets. At the end of 2008, CIC's assets totaled $298 billion.
CIC was launched in 2007, when 1.55 trillion yuan ($227 billion) in special treasury bonds were issued to create the capital it needed. According to Lou Jiwei, CIC chairman, the fund "needs to make a profit of 300 million yuan ($43.92 million) every day just to pay the interest on the bonds and operation costs."
In July 2007, State-owned Central Huijin Investment Corporation was merged into the new company as a wholly-owned subsidiary company holding stakes in domestic banks.
CIC's portfolio is about 25 percent stocks, 18 percent fixed income and 8.8 percent "anti-inflation" securities. It also allocates about 9.4 percent of its funds to a hedge fund, 7 percent to private equity, 8.6 percent to cash and 18.9 percent to "special situations," or, as Wang put it, "hunting," according to Reuters.
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