Industrial group Siemens says higher than expected returns - plus supplemental contributions - has cut the underfunding of its main pension plans to around e1.1bn – from e3.1bn six months ago.
“The funding status of Siemens’ principal pension plans on 31 March 2005 improved significantly compared with the end of the prior fiscal year, with an underfunding of around e1.1bn compared with an underfunding of approximately e3.1bn at 30 September, 2004,” Siemens said.
It put the improvement down to both “supplemental and regular” contributions – as well as higher than expected actual return on plan assets. It said the assets returned e936m in the last six months This represents a 10.1% return on an annualised basis, against an expected annualised return of 6.7%.
The Munich-based company has made multi-billion euro contributions to its pension plans in the last few years. It made payments of e1.25bn and e1.2bn in 2004 and 2003 respectively.