Strong all-round performance sees Super Fund grow by $9.3 billion

Continued outperformance by global equity markets helped boost the value of the New Zealand Superannuation Fund (the Fund) to $94.4 billion at the end of the 2026 financial year, $9.3 billion up on where it finished a year earlier.

Jo Townsend, CEO of fund manager the Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation (the Guardians), said the result was a satisfying one and followed strong performances by the Fund in the previous two years.

Fund returns of 14.17 percent (after costs and before NZ tax) for the 12 months to 30 June 2026 were well ahead of the 2.71 percent return on 90-Day Treasury bills for the same period but lagged the Reference Portfolio benchmark by 0.1 percentage points.

The Reference Portfolio is a notional, passively-managed portfolio of global equities and bonds that is used to determine the amount of value added by the Guardians’ active investment strategies. Eighty percent of the Reference Portfolio is in global equities, while the Fund contains a much broader range of assets.

Ms Townsend said the Fund’s portfolio, which spans timber, real estate and private market investments as well as listed companies, had performed exceptionally well in delivering such a strong result in the current market.

“In the short term, a concentrated portfolio can achieve strong results; however, over the long-term, we firmly believe a more diversified portfolio is better suited to our mandate.”​

Ms Townsend said the Fund’s returns over the past 20 years clearly demonstrated that, generating $22 billion over and above the passive benchmark.

“To put it another way, during that period the Fund has achieved an annual average return of 9.68 percent, as opposed to the Reference Portfolio's annual average return of 8.19 percent,” Ms Townsend said.

Earlier this year, the Guardians announced it had lowered the Fund’s long-term expected annual return from 7.8 percent to 7.2 percent.

Ms Townsend said that decision reflected the Guardians’ view that returns on equities were likely to decrease in the future and a reduction in the Fund’s active risk budget.

“Returns for US equities over the past couple of years are close to double annualised returns for the past 20 years, so we would expect there to be some reversion to the mean at some point,” she said.

Ms Townsend said lowering the expected return did not affect the Fund’s benchmarks.

“We will continue to be judged according to whether we deliver more value for taxpayers than would be generated by the Government using the Fund’s assets to pay down debt, and whether our long-term returns outperform a passive strategy with an equivalent risk appetite.”

The forecast value of the Fund is one of several inputs used by Treasury to calculate the amount the government is required to contribute to the Fund and when withdrawals can begin.

Ahead of this year’s budget, Finance Minister Nicola Willis said updated population projections and new inflation forecasts, along with the slower expected growth rate for the Fund, meant withdrawals were now forecast to commence in 2054.

Ms Townsend said the Fund was already making a positive contribution to the Crown’s balance sheet.

“Over the past year, we were again New Zealand’s largest taxpayer. Treasury forecasts that for the next five years our tax payments will exceed the Government’s required capital contribution by more than $1 billion a year, with the difference expected to top $2 billion in 10 years’ time.”

FY26 RESULTS - ALL NUMBERS PROVISIONAL AND UNAUDITED