Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM), about half of whose assets are in the U.S., posted a negative return of 1.9% for the January through March period, outperforming its benchmark index by 0.01 percentage point, reports Reuters.
“The result reflects a quarter with challenging market conditions,” Deputy CEO Trond Grande said in a statement. – “We saw limited impact on bonds and real estate, but it was the decline in equities, particularly among large U.S. technology companies, that determined the outcome.
The war, which began with coordinated U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran in late February, led to the deepest quarterly drop in the S&P 500 stock index (.SPX) since 2022, though markets have since recovered.
The fund’s equity investments returned negative 2.6%, while bond investments fell 0.2%, unlisted real estate rose 1.2% and unlisted renewable energy infrastructure fell 1.9%, it said.
The fund, which owns shares in more than 7,000 companies worldwide, had the largest holdings in Nvidia (NVDA.O), Apple (AAPL.O) and Microsoft (MSFT.O) as of early 2026, according to the latest data.
Last year, the fund reported a first-quarter loss of KRW 415 billion as weakening tech stocks hurt returns, underscoring how even a diversified portfolio can be affected by fluctuations in the market for large U.S. stocks.
