Finland’s Veritas reports 2.4% return in H1

Written by Adam Cadle

25/08/2023

Finnish pension insurance company, Veritas, returned 2.4% on its investments between January and June 2023, its half-year report has shown.

The value of the pension company’s investments amounted to €4.3bn at the end of June.

Veritas’ equity investments were the strongest performing asset, with a return of 4.8% during H1.

Its return on fixed income investments and ‘other’ investments was 3.5% and 0.6% respectively.

However, the pension insurance company’s investments in real estate saw a negative return of -3.3%.

At the end of June, Veritas’ solvency level was 122.3% and its solvency capital was 1.6 times the solvency limit.

Veritas investment director, Kari Vatanen, noted what while the year has started better than expected on the international stock market, the development in the Finnish stock market has been “very weak”.

“The general index on the Helsinki Stock Exchange has fallen by around 10% since the beginning of the year,” Vatanen continued.

“The weak development on the Helsinki stock exchange has its explanation in the industry structure.

“We lack large and international technology companies, and we have an extensive manufacturing industry.

“The manufacturing industry has fared worse in other parts of the world as well, but in Finland the earnings trend has been particularly weak.

“Veritas made a significant write-down on the direct real estate investments at the end of June. We wanted to make the value of the properties reflect the real market price in the changed environment.

“In the US, they can handle a tightening of the central banks' monetary policy without ending up in a recession, but I dare not promise that for Finland yet.

“Even in July, business confidence continued to fall in all industries except the service industry.”

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