GSIS, SSS stock market support hit almost P1 billion

MANILA, Philippines — The state-run pension funds Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) and Social Security System (SSS) bought nearly P1 billion in stocks to date, which Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III said supported the local stock market despite a global slump amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I will review with them in the next couple of days their position. I think, so far, they have already put almost a billion pesos in the stock market. And the results have been that yesterday and today, the stock market firmed up. I understand this morning they opened, up at 4 percent,” Dominguez said in an interview via Google Meet Wednesday.

“It showed that government institutions have confidence in the stock market and are providing liquidity and a willing buyer,” Dominguez added.

In a separate interview on Bloomberg Television, Dominguez said that “at this point in time, we will keep a steady hand in the market and we will see how this develops.”

Dominguez nonetheless pointed out that the GSIS and the SSS as “state funds have a responsibility to the future generations as well.”

The GSIS is the pension fund for government employees, while private sector workers contribute to the SSS.

“So while we are supportive of the market. we have to do it in a very responsible way,” Dominguez said.

Dominguez chairs the Social Security Commission (SSC), the SSS’s top policymaking body. As head of the Duterte administration’s economic team, Dominguez also supervises the GSIS.

Two weeks ago, Dominguez ordered the two pension funds to to take advantage of low stock prices and support the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) by at least doubling their daily average purchase volumes compared to last year.

Dominguez had said that while they ramped up purchases, the exposures of the GSIS and the SSS to PSE-traded equity securities remained below the mandatory limits imposed by their respective charters.

EDV