NPS ups stake in Samsung Electro-Mechanics, sells Kakao in Q4

A visitor waits for service at the National Pension Service's branch location in Seodaemun-gu, Seoul, Jan. 4. (Yonhap)

The National Pension Service, the world’s third-largest pension fund managing assets of around 1,000 trillion won ($757 billion), expanded its holdings in electronic parts manufacturer Samsung Electro-Mechanics, but dumped shares of IT giant Kakao in the September-December period of 2023.

The fund owns a 5 percent or greater stake in each of 283 listed companies here as of Wednesday, according to market tracker FnGuide. The shares are valued at 133.83 trillion won, up 4.16 trillion won, or 3.21 percent, from 129.67 trillion won at the end of the third quarter of last year.

The NPS held over 1 trillion won stake in 21 locally listed companies. Among the 21, its largest holdings were in Samsung Electronics (33.75 trillion won, 7.68 percent), followed by SK hynix (7.67 trillion won, 7.9 percent), LG Energy Solution (5.55 trillion won, 5.78 percent), Naver (3.52 trillion won, 9.34 percent), Hyundai (3.14 trillion won, 7.86 percent), Samsung Biologics (2.97 trillion won, 5.6 percent) and Kia (2.61 trillion won, 7.17 percent).

But during the fourth quarter, the pension fund shed 1.01 percentage points of its stake in Posco Holdings, the holdings company of steel-to-energy giant Posco Group, to 6.71 percent, while its share price dropped by more than 15 percent.

Its stake in Kakao, the operator of Korea’s No. 1 messenger app, was also reduced by 0.97 percentage point to 5.41 percent in the same period. But the appraised value of the holdings climbed by 179 billion won to 1.42 trillion won, as Kakao’s stock price increased by around 35 percent.

The NPS increased its stake in Samsung Electro-Mechanics by 1.82 percentage points to 10.62 percent in the fourth quarter, seeing the appraised value advance to 1.17 trillion won, surging 269 billion won. The share price of the Samsung affiliate increased by 7.5 percent.

The NPS’ total assets under management, including domestic equity, stood at 968.3 trillion won as of the end of October. But the figure is estimated to have surpassed 1,000 trillion won at the end of last year, buoyed by a recovery of the global stock market.