17
Temasek Holdings
This one number stands out from all the others in the 2012 review highlights of Singapore's sovereign wealth fund. Temasek claims that it has achieved an average total shareholder return of 17 per cent since inception in 1974, or 19 per cent in US dollar terms.
In response to this claim I shall now enter my own cryptic statement:
?
Let's first get it straight what a 17 per cent annual total return gain means. It says that net profits on Temasek's investments, taking in only market price appreciation and real capital gain plus interest and dividend income, was an average of 17 per cent of the market value of these investments across every year of the entire 38 years of this fund's existence.
Let's put it another way. If you were a private investment fund manager with this sort of record, you would have every investor in the world getting down on his knees to you and bowing every time you showed your face in public. You would be venerated as a deity. The world would be at your doorstep asking you to manage its money.
