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"Every three years gains from the investment returns are locked-in and the 90% guarantee is extended to these gains. This lock-in is not applied if the asset value has fallen below the last guaranteed sum over the previous three years."

Thanks for explaining the detail.

If I've correctly understood what you wrote, it sounds like they're offering downside protection. If investment returns have been so poor that you would have lost more than 10%, your loss is capped at 10%. Otherwise, you get the investment return (whether positive or negative, e.g. minus 9%). It's unclear if the investment return is net, i.e. is reduced by the cost of the downside protection.

I assume that the general rule ("up until now all German occupational pension plans have had to guarantee at least the contribution level") was that any loss would be capped at 0%, so you couldn't lose money in nominal terms.