Most investors in CPF Investment Scheme made money in 12 months ending Sept 30, 2016

The CPF Board said 78 per cent of the total CPFIS-Ordinary Account investors who invested their Ordinary Account investments during the period made money, up from 27 per cent in 2015. PHOTO: ST FILE

SINGAPORE - Members who invested their Central Provident Fund-Ordinary Account savings under the CPF Investment Scheme (CPFIS) generally made a profit in the 12 months to Sept 30 last year.

The CPF Board said 441,000 members - 78 per cent of the total CPFIS-Ordinary Account investors who invested their Ordinary Account savings - made profits in excess of the risk-free CPF-Ordinary Account interest rate of 2.5 per cent per annum (pa).

This is up from 27 per cent or 159,000 members in the previous year ended Sept 30, 2015. The board attributed the better performance in 2016 to improving financial markets.

The board has changed the methodology it uses to measure performance to get a more rounded idea of how members' investments are performing.

Besides excluding members with no investments in CPFIS, the new formula, which took effect for the 2015 financial year, assesses not only the realised profits and losses of investments that were sold but also the unrealised profits and losses that members held during the reporting period.

"This total P&L statistic will provide a more complete representation of the investors' total portfolio performance," said the CPF board.

Based on the new methodology, the number of CPFIS-Ordinary Account investors who had investments during the reporting period amounted to about 567,000 in 2016, down from 583,000 in 2015.

CPF members can invest their savings in bonds, stocks, unit trusts, exchange-traded funds, property funds and investment-linked insurance plans, while meeting the long-term objective of securing financial security in old age.

For the year ended Sept 30, 2016, about 60,000 members or 10 per cent made total profits equal to or less than the CPF-Ordinary Account interest rate, compared to about 84,000 (15 per cent) in 2015.

About 66,000 members in 2016 (12 per cent) made total losses, compared to about 340,000 (58 per cent) in 2015.

Over the two financial years from Oct 1 2014 to Sept 30, 2016, about 293,000 members (49 per cent) made cumulative total profits in excess of the CPF-OA interest rate of 2.5 per cent pa.

About 128,000 members (22 per cent) made cumulative total profits equal to or less than the CPF-OA interest rate. The remaining 172,000 members (29 per cent) made cumulative total losses.

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