EPF announces 2020 dividend payouts totalling RM47.64 billion
KUCHING: The Employees Provident Fund (EPF) declared a 5.2 per cent dividend with a payout amounting to RM42.88 billion for conventional savings for fiscal year 2020.
For shariah savings, it announced 4.9 per cent dividend with payout of RM4.76 billion.
In total, the dividend payouts for both savings in the year under review reached RM47.64 billion.
“With an average five-year real dividend of 4.62 per cent for conventional savings and 4.32 per cent for shariah savings after adjusting for inflation, EPF has exceeded its strategic target of declaring at least two per cent real dividend on average for a rolling five-year basis.
“We managed to safeguard our members’ retirement savings well, while meeting their immediate needs to deal with the current challenges.
“It was not easy at times as we had to walk a tightrope in ensuring that our members would survive the difficult times, while balancing their future needs. The quick spread of Covid-19 and its transmissibility made it a ‘Black Swan’ event that many found challenging to manage.
“However, we’re proactive in managing the pandemic, which had helped us ride through the challenges. Our focus on digitalisation had enabled us to assist our members more efficiently and seamlessly, while ensuring that we’d remain relevant to members who are more technology-savvy,” said EPF chairman Tan Sri Ahmad Badri Mohd Zahir in a statement.
According to him, EPF’s speed of adaptability in its investment strategy and processes ensured that it was able to deliver optimum performance, and it further leveraged on the strength of its approximately 250-strong investment professionals, who had been diligently managing the portfolios and taking proactive measures.
He added that solid teamwork and digital infrastructure had ensured that they could adapt seamlessly to the new work norms.
The EPF also rebalanced its investment portfolios based on thorough consideration on how the Covid-19 pandemic and global uncertainties such as the US presidential election in November last year, the continuous USChina trade dispute, and the impact of the Brexit negotiations, had influenced capital markets worldwide.
Looking ahead, Ahmad Badri said EPF would embark on a new withdrawal scheme to allow members to purchase insurance or takaful products, as announced under Budget 2021, slated for an end-of-year roll-out.
“We are also pleased to share that the EPF is the first institutional investor to establish the largest shariah-compliant private equity co-investment mandate in the world, with the launch of the US$600-million Shariah Private Equity Co-Investment Separate Managed Account.”
To date, there are 1.12 million EPF members who have opted for shariah savings – launched in 2016 to meet the demands of members to have their EPF savings managed and invested according to shariah principles.