15.07.2011 - Kosovo Pension Savings Trust (Trusti) has ended the second quarter of this year with gross investment returns of €3 million. Main reasons for this positive return are assets diversification and the overall global markets performance. With the increasing value of assets under management, Trusti increased its investments in instruments like bonds and securities, which in this quarter had a better performance then equities market. As a result, Trusti’s share price reached €1.059 from €1.054 as it was at the end of first quarter.

This investment return together with the one of the first quarter – which was around €11.5 million – bring Trusti’s investment returns for the first half of 2011 to around €14.5 million, or 2.63 percent. While the value of assets under management as of the end of second quarter is €546 million, increased from €519 million as it was at the end of first quarter.

At the beginning of this quarter global financial markets saw a solid increase as a result of increased optimism among investors and consumers. Their optimism was based on revenue reports of global companies, showing that projections made by experts were surpassed. But latter on, the reappearance of Greece’s debt crises shocked main global exchanges that caused a rapid fall. Reprogramming Greece’s debt and the decision of EU and IMF to extend additional funds, enabled the recovery of losses during the last days of the quarter.

EU and global market were also under the pressure of other debt crisis, particularly that of Portugal and Ireland, with potential crises in Italy and Spain. Because of these challenges in this half year, predictions of possible outcomes in the second half are different. But in each case, the decisions that are going to be taken to tackle debt issues in EU and USA, and also to manage the effects that were caused to industrial and financial markets by the catastrophe in Japan, are going to determine the global markets performance, and to a great extent Trusti’s investments performance.