EUR 24.1 million in contributions and 961,000 empty accounts in mandatory private pensions
Tomorrow CNPAS shall transfer EUR 24.11 million worth of contributions (RON 88.2 million) in the account of the 14 mandatory private pension funds (pillar II), in line with the initial expectations. The number of empty accounts is about 961,000: only 3.2 million participants shall received their contributions in the accounts, the rest up to over 4,156,000 participants representing empty accounts (without any contributions transferred), stated today the representatives of the authorities involved in the collection process, at a press conference organized to discuss this issue.
According to the Ministry of Labor’s calculations, the contribution is EUR 7.5 per participant, BELOW THE AVERAGE gross salary for March (to which the payments to be made tomorrow actually relate). To compare, the contribution (theoretically) in the case of an average gross salary in March would have been EUR 8.7 per participant. In other words, the almost 4.2 million participants to the mandatory private pension fund earn less than the average per economy: 14% less.
In February, CNPAS estimated the number of empty accounts to 1-1.5 million, so the real figure, of about 961,000, is better than the pessimistic estimates made back then. The situation is still not final, because the number of empty accounts depends significantly on the number and accuracy of the nominal declarations of contributions submitted by the employers.
The biggest players on the mandatory private pension market, ING and ALLIANZ-TIRIAC, commented for www.privatepensions.ro the data communicated today by the authorities.
"Almost one million empty accounts is very, very much, it actually represents an approximately 76% collection rate on the market. According to the data we received from CNPAS, the collection level for our portfolio shall be higher, namely over 80%. We must point out that the average contribution is also below the average per economy, namely about 7.5%", stated Radu VASILESCU, CEO of ING Pension Fund, the market leader with an almost 1.4 million client portfolio.
"The number of empty accounts is in line with our expectations, but it’s still very high. What remains to be seen is the quality of each administrator’s portfolio, as we estimate to have a share of empty accounts lower than the market average", commented Crinu ANDANUT, CEO of ALLIANZ-TIRIAC Private Pensions, the number two company on the market, with over 1 million clients.
