By Zebedee Giame
The National Superannuation Fund (Nasfund) has announced that the drop in interest offering by the banks this year will affect the dividend payouts.
Nasfund Acting CEO Rajeev Sharma confirmed this in Lae at the 2023 Employers Conference saying the interest offering on Treasury Bills and Government Inscribed Stock was at 7.2% just last year.
Mr Sharma says this year, the interest offering fell to 3.5%.
This he says this means that for the same investment Nasfund makes, it will receive a lesser amount in its interest.
Mr Sharma said, the dividend for this year will obviously be low.
According to Mr Sharma, Government inscribed stock is issued by the Government, with a maturity of 2 to 10 years.
He says Treasury Bills and Government Inscribed stock can be purchased through the Bank of PNG’s public offering.
However, Mr Sharma says In PNG, there is no secondary market and hence Government Inscribed Stock and Treasury Bills are not traded unlike other markets where demand, supply, surplus, shortage and maturity decide the trading price.
He emphasized that these Government securities are subject to International Financial Reporting System 9 provisioning, which in PNG is around 1.25 to 1.5 %.
To make matters worse, bank tax has increased from 30% to 45% which Nasfund Acting CEO Rajeev Sharma said will cut down Nasfund dividend this year by K30 million.
Nasfund is now hoping that some government economic investments will get off the ground this year to at least turn the tides.
