Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 15
By Anvar Mammadov – Trend:
As much as 49.2 percent of the investment portfolio of Azerbaijan’s State Oil Fund (SOFAZ) was concentrated in US dollars (nearly $16.24 billion) in 2016, said a SOFAZ report.
Total volume of SOFAZ’s investment portfolio stood at $33.03 billion as of Jan. 1, 2017, or 99.6 percent of the total volume of assets, according to the report.
Some 34.3 percent of the total investment portfolio of SOFAZ is concentrated in euros (10.75 billion euros), 4.8 percent - in British pounds (1.28 billion pounds), 1.1 percent - in Turkish liras, 0.6 percent - in Australian dollars, 1.6 percent - in Russian rubles, 1.2 percent - in South Korean won, 1.4 percent - in Chinese yuan, 1.1 percent - in Japanese yen, 1.3 percent - in other foreign currencies. The remainder of the portfolio (3.1 percent, or nearly $1.11 million) is concentrated in gold.
SOFAZ was established in 1999 with assets of $271 million.
As of Jan. 1, 2017, SOFAZ assets reduced by 1.3 percent compared to early 2016 ($33.57 billion) and amounted to $33.15 billion.
Based on SOFAZ's regulations, its funds may be used for the construction and reconstruction of strategically important infrastructure facilities, as well as solving important national problems.
The main goals of the State Oil Fund include: accumulation of resources and the placement of the fund's assets abroad in order to minimize the negative effect on the economy, the prevention of "Dutch disease" to some extent, promotion of resource accumulation for future generations and support of current social and economic processes in Azerbaijan.