CMPFO to invest in equity for first time; ropes in SBI MF

The apex body managing coal workers provident fund CMPFO, with a massive Rs 65,000 crore corpus, has for the first time decided to invest in equity and has roped in SBI Mutual Fund for it. The Coal Mines Provident Fund Organisation has selected SBI (PMS division), ICICI Securities Primary Dealership and Reliance Capital Asset Management as fund managers for its Rs 65,000 crore corpus of pension money belonging to 4.5 lakh coal workers. "CMPFO Board has for the first time decided to invest in equity as per the 2015 guidelines from the Ministry of Finance and accordingly SBI Mutual Fund has been selected for it," CMPFO Commissioner Animesh Bharti told PTI.

Bharti said the CMPFO Board has selected SBI (PMS division), RCAM and ICICI Securities Primary Dealership to manage about Rs 65,000 crore pension fund of coal workers. When asked about the amount to be invested in equity, Bharti said, "It will be 5 per cent on daily accrual basis. Roughly it will work out to Rs 500 crore annually at the present level of investment".

"CMPFO has allotted 35 percent of corpus SBI PMS and 30 percent each to ICICI Securities Primary Dealership and Reliance Capital Asset Management. The remaining 5 percent has been given to SBI Mutual Fund," he added. The agreement in this regard will be signed in the last week of October, he said, adding that the companies will start managing funds beginning November 2.

CMPFO is an autonomous organisation governed by a Board of Trustees and functions under the overall supervision of Ministry of Coal, Government of India. Currently CMPFO administrates Coal Mines Provident Fund Scheme, Coal Mines Family Pension Scheme (merged with Pension Scheme in 1998), Coal Mines Pension Scheme and Coal Mines Deposit Linked Insurance Scheme. CMPFO had invited two rounds of bids from MF companies technical and financial.