Irish pension funds down €27 billion

AN estimated €27 billion has been slashed from the value of Irish pension funds over the past 12 months. Figures from Rubicon Investment Consultants said the average managed fund declined by 34.8%.

Rubicon said Setanta Asset Management was the best performing manager in 2008, with a return of -29.6%. Hibernian Investment Managers had the worse performance of the year with a negative return of 38.8%.

One of the main reasons for the heavy losses was the fact that Irish pension funds were “substantially over-exposed” to an under-performing Irish stock market, as Irish shares tumbled by 65% over the year.