NEWS

Equity market drives Australian Super Funds’ 2024 returns

By Muskan Arora

Australia’s superannuation funds reported double digit returns for 2024, owing to the high performance of stocks, with a few achieving nearly 12% for their balanced fund offerings.

According to the Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia, Rest Super reported an 11.19% return for its default options last year, making it their second consecutive year of positive returns.

Rest’s high performance is largely due to its allocations in local and international equities. Further, the system’s high-growth option and its sustainable growth options also benefitted from the exceptional performance of the stock market returning 14.09% and 14.08% for calendar year 2024.

Kiran Singh, the co-CIO believes that strong returns over the short-term, assist in reaching the long-term goals.


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“Global share markets were standout performers—especially the U.S.—during the past year. With several central banks moving to ease monetary policy and markets responding positively, we anticipate this should continue in 2025,” said Singh.

Equity valuations are elevated but, for now, they are supported by continued economic resilience and earnings growth,” added Singh, in the report.

Further, Australian Retirement Trust returned 11.9% in 2024, with the outperformance of high-growth options returning 13.7% as both domestic and global share markets are the key drivers of the performance.

Additionally, My Super’s 1950s and 1960s options returned 9.8% and 11.5%, similar to the returns of Rest.

“The quality of returns reflects strategic allocation and active performance by our equity and credit managers to asset classes and our overweight to stocks, which we expected to perform strongly during the year, and this strategy has been successful,” said Anna Shelly, AMP’s CIO in the report.

“We’ve been increasing our exposure to private debt and diversified credit, which have delivered high and consistent returns. Our previous relatively low allocation to direct property has allowed us to increase this exposure by buying from motivated sellers at deep discounts,” she added.

Further, Shelly’s investment to bitcoins yielded positive returns for the asset allocation program.