Allianz Bulgaria - Pension Insurance Company JSC - Sofia

Pension funds now manage over 15 billion euros The pension system in Bulgaria is based on three pillars - mandatory state pension insurance, mandatory additional pension insurance in pension funds and voluntary pension insurance in pension funds. There are 10 pension funds in Bulgaria: "DSK-Rodina", "Doverie", "Saglasie", "Allianz", UBB, "CCB-Sila", "Badeshte", "Toplina", "DallBogg" and "Pension Insurance Institute". Their total net assets as of the end of September exceed 15 billion euros. However, the average accumulated funds in the accounts remain relatively small at the moment. Everyone can also create their own, fourth, pillar - savings and personal investments, which, if managed correctly, can not only be a supplement, but also outpace the others. For the last 12 months, the universal pension funds mandatory for everyone born after 1959 have registered an average yield of over 6%. The net assets of universal pension funds (UPF) exceed EUR 13.3 billion at the end of September, compared to nearly EUR 11.9 billion at the end of December 2024. Universal funds are only part (albeit the largest) of the pension system - in addition to them, there are professional pension funds (PPF), voluntary pension funds (VPF) and voluntary pension funds under professional schemes (VPFS), with their assets the system manages EUR 15 billion. About 4.13 million people have a stake in universal pension funds, which makes them the most indicative for the sector due to their large volume. Of these, over 1 million are in the Doverie fund, and about 835 thousand - in DSK-Rodina, followed by Allianz Bulgaria with about 795 thousand people. It is the Allianz fund that has the best return for the last 12 months compared to the end of January 2026 with nearly 8%, but DSK-Rodina and Doverie also registered good returns - over 7% and slightly under 8%, respectively. The numbers are against the backdrop of returns of over 15% for the S&P 500 for the last year, over 16% for the German DAX and over 50% for Sofix. Pension funds invest only 30% in equity instruments, which limitation is related to the limits imposed by the regulator FSC. The average amount of accumulated funds of insured persons reached nearly 6.3 thousand leva as of the end of September. However, the individual amount of accumulated funds in the accounts of insured persons varies significantly and depends on many factors such as: the duration of the insurance period, contributions, income, fees, and so on. Voluntary participation funds are significantly smaller than mandatory ones, but still have shares in them over 630 thousand people. Over a third of people are in the voluntary fund of "Allianz". The profitability of voluntary funds is slightly higher than mandatory ones for the last 12 months - nearly 8%. The higher profitability is due to the fact that a higher share - over 40% of their assets - is in equity capital. "In voluntary funds, we have greater freedom to invest," says Milen Markov, which also explains their higher profitability than directly mandatory ones. Their net assets are about 840 million euros as of the end of September. As the name suggests, these funds are not mandatory, but are part of the so-called third pillar with voluntary contributions. Nearly 70% of them are personal contributions, and about 30% come from contracts with an employer. In total, the contributions for the first nine months of last year in them are over 51 million euros. Workers in the first and second categories of labor, such as miners, machinists, drivers and others, are entitled to additional pension insurance, which is covered by the employer. It is for them that the professional pension funds are intended, which should provide them with a supplement after the early retirement to which they are entitled. The profitability of these is similar to that of universal funds - about 6% in the last year. Over 330 thousand people are insured in the mandatory PPFs as of the end of September, with more than half of them in "Doverie", "DSK-Rodina" and "Allianz". The assets of the professional funds reached almost 1 billion euros as of September 30, with the average amount of accumulated funds in the accounts being about 3 thousand euros. Each company has its own investment policy - DSK-Rodina, Doverie and UBB, for example, have a more conservative approach with more shares abroad, while Saglasie, Sila, Badeshte and Toplina, for example, prefer more Bulgarian shares, which also include a high stake in companies related to their economic groups. This can be positive if invested in liquid companies on the Bulgarian Stock Exchange, as they support investments in the economy, but it can also be risky if this happens in illiquid companies, as the exit from such companies is a little more complicated. The mandatory funds of Saglasie, Toplina and Sila alone, for example, have nearly 25 million euros invested in the real estate company Velgraf Asset Management - a company with about 175 million euros of capitalization on the stock exchange, where the trading volume for the first 15 days of January was only 400 shares. And this is not the only illiquid company that is present in the investment portfolios of a particular part of pension companies. If an exit from these investments is necessary, it is quite uncertain whether a buyer will be found and, most importantly, at what price.