Dutch investment institutions have produced their best performance figures since the start of the financial crisis, with returns of 18% on average last year, according to regulator De Nederlandsche Bank (DNB).

It said it found the returns for these institutions and investment funds ranged from almost 4% for hedge funds to 27% for equity funds.

The supervisor noted that, despite a lack of profit growth among listed companies in Europe and the US, equity worldwide yielded high returns, in part thanks to falling interest rates.

In 2018, Dutch equity funds lost 6% on average, it said.

Since interest rates in the euro area continued to decline until the end of August, bond funds also managed to achieve profitable returns in 2019, DNB added.

In the fourth quarter they had to give up some of this growth, but for 2019 as a whole they achieved returns of almost 11%.

With 3.8%, hedge funds were the only type of funds that achieved returns below 10%, the regulator reported.

This type of fund generally does not confine itself to a single category of investment – such as equity, bonds or real estate – but seeks to achieve positive returns by leveraged funding or by pursuing a strategy that is not tied to general market indices, it explained.

DNB also stated that the value of each euro invested 11 years ago had increased to €2.37 on average across all investment institutions.

Investors that had solely targeted equity funds had seen the value of each euro invested rise to €3.60, according to the supervisor.