Guan Eng debunks claims of EPF incurring RM6 bil loss in a month

PARLIAMENT | The daily movement of the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) does not have an impact on the dividends paid out by the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) as it is the policy of the retirement fund to declare dividends based on its net profit, said Lim Guan Eng.

The Finance Minister said when compared to the original shares purchase price or book value, the EPF still recorded profits overall.

“However, the shares are not sold, hence the profits are not recorded and are unrealised gains,” he said when replying to a question by Adham Baba (BN-Tenggara) during the oral question-and-answer session at the Dewan Rakyat today.

Adham asked the government to address the losses incurred by the EPF within one month totalling RM6.09 billion .

Lim said referring to its management financial statement performance, it was not true that the EPF incurred an RM6 billion loss within a month.

“This is not accurate as it was based on the movement of the FBM KLCI.

“The ups and downs of the benchmark index are influenced by factors such as vibrant economic growth, good financial corporate governance as well as political stability locally and overseas,” he said.

Lim said with investors’ confidence in the country’s economic management, he was optimistic the EPF’s investment performance would recover.

Meanwhile, he said the decline in the stock market performance was due to, among others, the heightened uncertainties in the market direction at the global level including the trade conflicts between the United States (US) and China, Canada, Mexico and the European Union.

Besides that, there were other factors that caused the fall in the stock market performance such as the increase in the US interest rates which sparked the funds outflow from developing countries and the plunge in the value of the Turkish lira against the US dollar of 45 percent since 2017 due to internal problems, he added.

The benchmark FBM KLCI performance was the best this year within the Asia Pacific region covering Japan, Korea, China, ASEAN countries and Australia up to Aug 13, with Malaysia recording a gain of 0.04 percent. - Mkini