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 The NBAS Luncheon Meeting 29th of June saw Mr. Sigbjørn Johnsen, Norwegian Minister of Finance as guest speaker. His presentation was entitled: “The Norwegian Economy—Prospects and Challenges”. In spite that summer vacation had set in and the Norwegian Colony would be on holiday, we saw 90 participants at the luncheon. Mr. Sigbjørn Johnsen was in great form and held an inspired speech starting with how Norway first found oil in the North Sea and how the rules for exploitation of this resource was decided in the early seventies – and are still sound today. Further he went into detail on how the Government Pension Fund Global was started and how it had grown into what we see today. The Finance Minister also talked about how the Norwegian economy had weathered the global financial crisis.
Finance Minister Johnsen’s visit to Singapore was occasioned by the official opening of Norges Bank Investment Management’s (NBIM) Singapore Office, a representative office of Norges Bank. The office will help NBIM’s existing office in Shanghai to cover the increasingly important Asia region. Various representatives of the Singapore authorities and local business community, including trade and industry minister Lim Hng Kiang, were also at the opening ceremony. Sigmund Kyrdalen has been appointed general manager in Singapore. He is a senior portfolio manager at NBIM and managed NBIM’s London office for two years. The Government Pension Fund Global had a market value of almost 2 800 billion kroner at the end of June. Around 10 percent of the fund is invested in Asia, and around 15 percent of its equity investments are in Asian companies. Besides Singapore, NBIM has offices in Oslo, London, New York and Shanghai.”
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