World Largest Sovereign Wealth Funds: Main Trends and Development

Sovereign wealth fund (SWF) a state-ownedinvestment fund composed of financial assets such asstocks, bonds, property, precious metals or otherfinancial instruments. SWFs invest globally. Some ofthem have grabbed attention making bad investments inseveral Wall Street financial firms (Citigroup, Morgan Stanley, and Merrill Lynch). They needed acash infusion due to losses resulting frommismanagement and mortgage crisis. MostSWFs are funded by foreign exchange assets. Theaccumulated funds may have their origin in, or mayrepresent foreign currency deposits, gold, SDRs andInternational Monetary Fund reserve positions held bycentral banks and monetary authorities, along withother national assets such as pension investments,oil funds, or other industrial and financialholdings. These assets of the sovereign nations are typically held in domestic and differentreserve currencies such as the dollar, euro and yen. Such investment management entities may be set up asofficial investment companies, state pension funds,or sovereign oil funds, among others. The currentwork examines the caracteristics of the world biggestSWFs in different countries.