Norway's Government Pension Fund Global, Oslo, returned 1.6% in the third quarter on positive fixed income and equity returns, improving its assets to 9.74 trillion Norwegian kroner ($1.07 trillion).
The return equated to a 236 billion kroner gain for the quarter, an update Wednesday from the world's largest sovereign wealth fund showed. It recorded a loss of 0.13% for the year ended Sept. 30.
The annualized net return for the five years ended Sept. 30 was 6.5%, while the 10-year period showed 7.6%.
The update noted that equities, which accounted for 69.1% of the fund's allocation, returned 1.3% for the quarter, compared with 3% in the previous quarter and 3% for the quarter a year ago.
The biggest gain was from North American stocks, which returned 2.9%. U.S. stocks, the sovereign wealth fund's single largest market allocation at 40%, also gained 2.9%. European stocks produced a flat return, while U.K. equities lost 0.2%, and Asia and Oceania equities returned a combined 0.8%.
The sovereign wealth fund's 28.2% fixed-income allocation added 2.4% for the quarter vs. a 3% gain for the previous quarter and -0.3% for the third quarter of 2018.
The fund's 2.8% unlisted real estate allocation returned 1.6% for the quarter, compared with 0.8% in the previous quarter and 1.1% in the year-earlier period.
"We saw a particularly positive contribution from U.S. treasuries and North American stocks," said Yngve Slyngstad, CEO of Norges Bank Investment Management, the manager of the fund, in a news release.
"The return on our equity investments has helped the fund's market value to rise considerably," Mr. Slyngstad said, adding, "With a large part of the fund invested in equities, we must be prepared for large fluctuations in the fund's market value."
