The Government Pension Investment Fund, which manages the reserves for the National Pension and Employees' Pension Insurance, said Monday it incurred an investment loss of ¥3.59 trillion in the April-June quarter.
The fourth-largest quarterly loss on record was largely due to stock price falls both at home and abroad resulting from the sovereign debt crisis in Europe, slower economic activity in the U.S. and the yen's appreciation, analysts said.
The yield in the first quarter of fiscal 2010 was minus 2.94 percent, fund officials said.
Last year the fund chalked up a return of ¥9.19 trillion, the largest for a single year, thanks to strong foreign stock prices.
Excluding a profit of ¥68.6 billion on the underwriting of Fiscal Investment and Loan Program bonds issued by the government, losses through market investments in the April-June quarter totaled ¥3.66 trillion.
Investments in domestic stocks lost ¥2.05 trillion, overseas stocks ended up ¥2.26 trillion in the red and overseas bonds lost ¥761.7 billion. Investment in domestic bonds yielded ¥1.42 trillion.