Azerbaijan, Baku, July 23 /Trend E.Ismayilov/
State Oil Fund of Azerbaijan (SOFAZ) is considering real estate objects in several European countries and South-East Asia for investment, executive director of the Fund Shahmar Movsumov said at a press conference on the results of activity in the first six months of this year.
"In particular, we consider the objects of real estate in London, Paris, Rome, Moscow, Istanbul, as well as in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia," the head of the foundation said.
On the issue of investing in shares, Movsumov noted that, given the risks associated with significant changes in prices observed on global financial markets and stock markets, SOFAZ plans the first investment in shares in September this year.
Some 85 percent of the investment portfolio of the State Oil Fund in 2012 will be formed at the expense of money market instruments and debt market. It is provided by the fund's investment policy for 2012, approved by the President of Azerbaijan.
Up to five percent of the investment portfolio may be invested in shares, five per cent - in real estate, five per cent - in gold, the document says. The maximum amount of the portfolio in stocks is determined in the oil fund's investment policy for the first time during the year, and real estate and gold are the new directions for the investment of the fund.
The projected total cost (average volume) of the investment portfolio of SOFAZ for 2012 is set at 23 billion manat, while it was predicted at 19.4 billion manat at the end of 2011.
SOFAZ assets increased by 9.6 percent as of July 1, 2012 compared to the beginning of this year (29.8 billion), amounted to $32,666 million.
State Oil Fund was established in 1999 and at that time, its assets amounted to $271 million.
Official exchange rate on July 23 is 0.7857 AZN/USD