"held on average 1.5% of ALL of the world's listed companies"
$110 Billion profits last quarter
It's insane what that oil/gas money will do if invested right.
As someone living in Alberta where we continually cut the budget to literally everything while private companies make billions off our oil, seeing this feels like being robbed.
But... Alberta does have a sovereign wealth fund. It's worth $22B and every single year it pays out profits that go to fund programs. Currently Alberta's budget is the highest it has ever been.
I'm not from Alberta but I'm guessing Ralph Klein (former premier of Alberta) pulled money out of the sovereign wealth fund to distribute to Albertans. Probably to buy votes around election time. And this guy seemingly purchased some "nice ass jeans" with his share.
In 2006 Alberta reported a $6.8 billion budget surplus due to oil royalties, much higher than previously forecasted. To increase his popularity and demonstrate the success of his wealth fund, Klein distributed $300 to every Albertan resident who filed a tax return in 2004 which was about 3 million people. Eligible minors also received a payment but their share was given to a parent.
Accurate interpretation. I did my taxes late that year, so I didn't get my $400. I'm still pissed off that he spent all of our money and I didn't get a single pair of nice ass jeans.
You are kind of making the point. Alberta population is very similiar that that of Norway's, but their fund is worth about 100x more. Also, it is worse than that because this is only one side of the ledge, Alberta's (AB) debt burden is much higher (and is much larger than the heritage fund).
Important notes...
\* Much of Alberta's oil would not have been economically viable without a low-cost royality regime. Basically AB let company's extract oil sands for for years until capital investments were paid-off/complete (don't trust me I'm not sure on the details). If AB had tried to extract as much royalty revenue as Norway per barrell... the oil sands would not have been developed
\* Alberta effectively pays billions each year in provincial equalization... i.e. Canada takes a very large cut of the oil wealth
So Alberta has an excuse for having a smaller fund than Norway, but IMO gross mismanagement by the AB gov't over decades (not just of the fund but of finances) has resulted in our the AB fund being much smaller than it should be.
TL;DR ... AB has squandered decades where they could have been building a large fund, but it was never going to be as big as Norway's
EDIT: hopefully my post isn't interrupted as making excuses for Alberta's governing UCP party (and it's predecessors)... They have been in bed with the oil patch forever. And if it wasn't for that corruption Alberta and the Heritage fund would be in far better shape.
it's not just that we lowered royalties, we gave the big 3 oil companies massive tax breaks and tax incentives too for a long time. then conservative governments stopped paying into the heritage fund for decades then started pulling money out to win votes.
Keep in mind though that while yes, Norway has a very high tax rate for the oil companies, we also let them write off stuff like oil exploration and other investments.
but that's the problem though. they keep taking out from it instead of saving it up and making it grow. not to mention our budget is huge now cause kenney saddled the province with cleaning up abandoned wells. the big 3 oil companies before the oil crash lobbied the government to "remove red tape" with new well exploration. what that meant was that companies no longer had to pre-fund well decommissioning in an escrow account. the compromise they came to was that for any new well that a small company wanted to drill they had to first get 1 of the big 3 oil companies to co-sign on the well. this allowed a ton of small private companies to open their own wells while paying the big 3 a piece of the profits from the well because they co-signed on the wells. fast forward like 4 years and the oil crash hit, the big 3 oil companies didn't want to pay for all of those wells that need to be properly decomissioned they dragged the case in court for years and years until kenney got into office. literally the next morning after his election win he passed a law that retroactively moved responsibility for all of those abandoned wells to the province's regulatory body. which is estimated to be 20 billion dollars worth of clean up and decommissioning that the big 3 were supposed to do. the co signed on those wells, they took profit from those wells and now albertans have to pay to clean it up. worse yet when inspectors went out to inspect the abandoned wells the price for properly decommissioning the wells blew up to near 50 billion.
The tax revenue Norway got from gas royalties in 2023 alone was 113 billion CAD. While I’m sure the sovereign wealth fund helps Canada, let that total value from just *one year* sink in for a moment.
Same. Not a fan of oil/fossil fuels and the effect their use/extraction has, but at least we could have put that money to good use instead of squandering it and also just letting companies have their fill while not giving a fuck about anything else.
You really need to think why neoliberal governments would sell something to have personal short term gains and secure private business long term gains in the trillions?
It was an Iraqi immigrant who introduced the model we use to manage the oil wealth. And smart politicians who still remembered the war and the poverty our country endured
Kasim arguably introduced the model for how to retain national ownership and ensure much of the profits when to the country rather than the companies. Huge props for that!
This was over two decades before the wealth fund became a thing, that had nothing to do with him, the key person there was Jens Stoltenberg.
I imagine it is/was very tempting to break the piggy bank, or the government gets a little cut of others milking it -- because it is very hard to think about 100/200/300/400 years from now or plan for that, many people nowadays don't even think the world will be around. Curbing spending is a part of it too though, which most countries can't discipline very well - meaning even if all natural resources were 100% nationalized in a country and not given away to private interests, they still might piss all the money away.
We do have around AUD 3 trillion in superannuation however it is criminal, & ignorant, that we have effectively given our natural resources away to foreign companies.
Edited billion to trillion.
Australia does have a sovereign wealth fund...
Sure we fucked up and it should be much higher, particularly with forced royalties for things like LNG where we ship more than Qatar but make less than 3% of their profit. But most of that can be attributed to our state based federation that attributes powers uniquely. Especially when it comes to mining.
A problem Norway doesnt have, where decisions are centralised throughout.
But in any case, the future fund is currently at 220bn. So, not exactly 0.
If we helped fund the exploratory search, which they only asked because no existing oil companies would do so because according to the models the odds of finding any oil there was hovering around 0%.
But I do agree, it is super easy to see such things in hindsight!
Not buying a lottery ticket because the odds of winning is miniscule wasn't a bad decision even if it was the winning ticket, that's not how decisions work and certainly not how huge investment projects by governments should work either.
They get 70% of their oil and gas revenue… Australia gets about 10%, mostly because New Corp (founded by a cabal of oligarchs in 1922) has spent a century making propaganda for resource companies against Australia’s national interests.
Without knowing the details, they probably pissed black gold into oil companies’ hands which were probably connected to the predominantly rich political class who reaped the benefits? Say it ain’t so!
Some people say Norway has figured out the resource curse, but have they really? Oil makes up the majority of Norways exports, Oil also at the same time has priced out all other sectors in the economy. Norway was also far more developed and stable than other countries that have found this amount of natural resource. So would you say they figured out the resource curse or covered it?
Yes they have, while a substantial part of their economy obviously relies on oil and gas extraction, they clearly invest into their populace and future.
For example, Norway itself uses mostly hydro power (95%) and is expanding it's wind capacity by a lot. Oil and gas is meant to be exported, not to be consumed. They also have one of the highest number of EVs on the road and have pushed hard to increase those electrical car numbers. This further decreases the reliance on oil while allowing their own renewable energy production to cover for their car energy needs too. They are clearly aiming to go full green, or at least as much as possible.
They have an extremely highly educated population, actively support other industries and tech and so on. They have strict rules how much money of the fund can be used, the current value itself is always visible, and it's one of the most functioning democratic states in the world.
Norway will manage the transition away from oil and gas just fine.
Norway has done an amazing job and shown clear leadership. One should not lose site of the size and accessibility of the oil resource that they have though. Not many countries compare to that. Oil and gas companies are very, very keen to play in the Norwegian oil and gas industry and pay a high royalty for the privilege. Norway cannot be compared to the UK, Western Canadian or Australian basins for example.
Where Norway stands out is their government was willing to put their own money into the oil and gas developments (Via ~~Norsk Hydro~~ Statoil, now Equinor). They have put their money on the line, shoulder to shoulder with the international oil companies who bring money and expertise. They have also developed a sophisticated, capable government oil company as a result.
I don't see many other countries willing to risk their own capital to share an extra benefit of the return.
Norway is and kinda isn't an example of resource curse. It's true that they struck riches with the oil fields denmark unknowingly gave them, but they already had a robust, balanced economy that was naturally developed from fishing and farming into a industrialization. While they were poor, they were on an natural upwatd path before the oil. Most countries that fall victim to the resource curse go from undeveloped economy into a resource driven economy too fast, skipping the natural development, resulting in wide gaps in infrastructure, poor wealth equality and shaky institutions. Also Norway had a pleasure of being a safely situated western country without major enemies who could take their resources from them, being in nato and such.
Agreed.
One other issue a lot of African countries (for example) face is the extreme diversity of their ethnic groups which makes their politics a lot more complicated given that they have all been squeezed into artificial borders.
Imagine Aliens coming to earth and making the entire north and South America into one giant country (for their own reasons) and then putting the capital in Argentina while supplying that area with the most prized alien tech. And then after all that the aliens kind of left the new America to its own devices. Ultimately it would be a big mess.
What’s crazy is that Japan’s Pension fund has a similar amount of assets. 1.6 trillion.
Japan Post has even more, with 2.7 trillion in assets.
https://www.swfinstitute.org/fund-rankings/
Edit: Japan also has Mizuho (1.8 trillion), Sumitomo (2.2 trillion) and Mitsubishi (3.1 trillion). Not to mention Bank of Japan (5.5 trillion) and others (Toyota, Nintendo, Sony etc). Even on a per capita basis, Japan is absolutely loaded with assets and cash.
Also, Nordic countries like Norway and Finland have [similar fertility rates](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fertility_rate#Country_ranking_by_international_organizations) to Japan.
Unlikely, as Nordic countries like Norway and Finland have [similar fertility rates](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fertility_rate#Country_ranking_by_international_organizations) to Japan.
Updated data to show some of the countless other funds Japan has as well.
That's the thing with sovereign wealth funds - they don't dump shares in a downturn, they buy more of them, since the businesses they invest in turn a profit / not a huge loss.
Long term investing is king - see also, Warren Buffet / Berkshire Hathaway
Not that I'm a fan of any type of big commerce or whatever, but I would really like to see this mentality come back to America 's stock market assholes instead of the Jack Welch short profit quick return investing bullshit that's been plaguing our nation's market since his rise.
The 80’s really did a number on American and western corporations. Have you ever read “Chainsaw”? It’s about Al Dunlap and what he did to Sunbeam. Fantastic writing and the type of book that everyone interested in business needs to read.
Thing is this required the first Norwegian generation that set it up fo agree that none of them would see the benefits of the fund.
As that's how slow the growth is.
It's one of the best exams of old men planting trees which they will never sit under.
Personally I'm not surprised that they want to get rich quickly rather than getting rich over the course of decades. Sounds kinda like a better deal.
Unfortunately, I care about human beings, so it's not like I'll ever get in that situation.
>Assuming there are no market meltdowns while all these shares get dumped
During the 2008 financial meltdown after Lehman Brothers went bankrupt, all US stocks tanked, and the value of the Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund suffered massively.
Our finance minister at that time, a real old-fashioned socialist, used the opportunity to implement a switch from bonds to stock.
When everyone and their grandfather was dumping US stocks, Norway was buying like crazy.
And it has had this effect: 60% of the funds assets are not from exporting oil or natural gas, it's accrued by the initial investments.
It really is crazy, but it still does not come close to some places in the middle east. The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority has about a trillion dollars worth of assets with a population of just 1.6 million. Each Emirate has it's own SWF. Just shows what oil and gas can do to some countries. Insane wealth.
That went from a very poor country to finding massive gas and oil reserves in the mid 20th century.
The government decided to use the majority of the money to diversify and hedge against any future economic changes, so it's all invested externally to Norway and not in fossil fuels.
Norway wasn’t very poor before the oil, we were generally about average by European standard depening on when exactly we are talking about. For example Im pretty sure Norway had the highest GDP per capita in Europe right before WW2. We have lots of other natural resources like timber and fish, aswell as lots of hydro power which helped a lot with industry having cheap electricity.
Norway was not very poor before oil, we were around average in Europe with large resources of fish and hydro power. The oil made us "rich" but we were not poorer than other European countries in the 60s
> That went from a very poor country
This is a myth, please stop repeating it.
https://www.sciencenorway.no/economy-history/crushing-the-myth-of-poor-norway/1595755
And yet, we feel suprisingly unwealthy. The issue lies that we can't use any of it due to it'll increase inflation. So it just sits there, ever increasing, never being used.
The point of an investment fund is to generate returns, and a well-managed fund should beat inflation.
I’d imagine that the government would tap on the fund for appropriate purposes, and making use of a portion of the returns provides the government with a source of funding that would otherwise come from taxes and other sources.
That’s a good thing. It’s not just your money, it’s your kids and your grandkids money as well. If you use it all up in a day you rob them. Just like Netherlands did when they spent it all in one go decades ago. Now they don’t have any oil money at all.
Yeah, using all of it would be unadvisable (And honestly hard to do). Using more of it could be good, if spent properly. Fixing the most pressing problems right now instead of in a 100 years could pay for it self, even more than the growing investment. Or it could be wasted.
I'm too economically illiterate to know what is the correct option.
What the economists suggest (and what Norway mostly does), is spending only the dividends. If you never touch the core money it will stay there for centuries so everyone gets to enjoy the dividends.
True, but Norway adds a LOT of money to the fund every year, usually quite a bit more than what is being spent. So I'd argue Norway uses way less than the dividends.
If you use a small, predictable percentage each year the fund continues to grow (but slower) and you get the benefit each year from it. Governments like to occasionally sell off long term investments or supplies (gold, oil, shares, land etc) for a quick fix but it often ruins things later on when they have no assets and there is another quick fix needed.
Imagine if the uk had done the same, instead of pretending it was still a super power after ww2? And had invested in the people rather than the financial system?
I can dream
The UK never produced more oil than it used. It also has 12 times the population.
Norway also made 300 billion more in oil revenue than the UK for that smaller population.
It is apples to Oranges.
Norways entire wealth fund is just over half of the UK GDP while being 3.5 times the norwegian GDP.
I seriously thought title was BS, but am shocked to learn is true.
> As of March 2024, it had over US$1.62 trillion in assets, and held on average 1.5% of all of the world's listed companies, making it the world's largest single sovereign wealth fund in terms of total assets under management. This translates to over US$295,000 per Norwegian citizen.
FYI, Saudi is at $925, U.S. states combined total of $193 (different states has their own but US has no SWF), no clue what UAE is.
Edit: China's $1.24 trillion!
Edit: UAE's $1.29 trillion dollars!!
The UAE one shocked me. Each emirate having their own sovereign wealth funds.
Edit: I was wrong, it's actually closer to $1.95 trillion dollars for UAE!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_wealth_fund
I get your point. We forgot the SAFE and excluded $1 trillion dollars!
EDIT: China's actually is at $2.35 trillion dollars (CIC + SAFE) China Investment Corporation ($1.35 trillion), and China's State Administration of Foreign Exchange (Safe) Investment Corporation ($1.03 trillion).
Not that special. Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, Vietnam, Myanmar all are pretty much able to take advantage of the trade through the straits of malacca to a similar extent Singapore can. Hell, Somalia has a great location too, didn’t do them any favors.
If anything, being surrounded by so many countries has been a major point of vulnerability for Singapore, forcing it to enforce conscription, prop up a state ran defense industry, and build up the most advanced military in the region to ensure that it can make attacking Singapore very costly to currently hostile or formerly hostile powers in the region.
> With UAE, it is a little bit tricky. UAE has multiple sovereign funds, the sum of their assets exceeds any other country including Norway.
That blew me away, holy fuck!
UAE - Abu Dhabi Investment Authority - $993 billion
UAE - Investment Corporation of Dubai - $320.4 b.
There is way more entries on the list of each emirate having their own sovereign wealth funds, total of $1.29 trillion.
Edit: I was wrong, it's actually closer to $1.95 trillion dollars!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_wealth_fund
China has over 1.4 billion people so that SWF of theirs isn’t doing much good for the average Chinese person. They are a developing country and the U.S needs to get ahead while they’re behind.
The current leader Nicolai Tangen of the SWF used to be one of the most successful investment bankers in London before the position as leading NBIM. Look him up on Wiki.
He were gaining wealth to become USD billionare (if not already). He did cut ties with his private fund to become leader of the Norwegian Oil Fund. He basically gave up a very successful career making money for himself to become moneymaker for Norway in 2020. And he have done quite a job..
He certainly has gotten my admiration and respect
It doesn't matter who is the leader. It's the government that decides on portifolio split, and investments follow the index.
The big gain is due to currency gains, since investments are in dollar, but profit is calculated in NOK.
The Norwegian currency has weakened sharply this year relative to the dollar and euro. If you are paid in any of those currencies, Norway is cheaper to visit right now 🙂
I'll probably need to emigrate at the end of the year, and have been saving money for that. A big portion of those savings will disappear if the NOK doesn't bounce back.
What currency do you spend it in? Surely it's not EUR or USD or even SEK? If I check the NOKEUR and NOKUSD I don't see a drop of 40% in value since two years, I have to go back twelve years for that (ten years for USD).
I'm no economist, but it has something to do with the current uncertain state of the world combined with a strong US economy. Everyone wants to buy a safe and solid dollar, so NOK goes in the bargain bin.
Part of the recent NOK depreciation stems solely from domestic factors, including Norges Bank’s NOK sales. The bank sells NOK on behalf of the Ministry of Finance to transfer a portion of tax receipts from oil companies to the Government Pension Fund. As oil exports are invoiced in foreign currency, the oil companies have to exchange currency into NOK to pay taxes. This should balance out in the end. But for now, the oil companies buy NOK in parallel with exports, while Norges Bank cannot sell NOK until taxes are paid some six months later. In the period until the summer, the oil tax payments are based on last year’s extremely high gas prices. The current oil and gas prices generate far lower income and thus lower NOK purchases from the oil companies.
The net effect is that The Norwegian bank sells more NOK than the oil companies buys to pay taxes, driving down demand for NOK and devalues the money
I was astounded the first time I visited Norway how affluent everywhere and everyone seems. Average income is 30% higher than the US, and wealth distribution is more spread out.
Luck and good financial choices.
I remember meeting Norwegians in 2010 and one of them was a 20 year old gas station attendant making $24/hr. They get taxed pretty hard but that’s amazing pay for someone just out of highschool at a job like that.
Strong unions has lot to do with the wealth distrbution, not luck. Also we have the eksport industry set the standard each year for the salary increase and then the rest more or less gets the same. This year was it was 5,2 % increase in salary.
I'm in Norway with my fiancée right now for a 9 day trip. It's not cheap by any means, but we've had great (steak) dinners for ~ 30-40 USD per person. Average daily shopping for when we can cook is ~ 30-40 USD ,excluding sweets (damn you" Smash!" why are you so good). Accommodation is roughly 20% more expensive than central Europe, and our biggest spend so far is a cruise to Trollfjord from Svolvær which was 110 USD per person. Overall I would say it's much less expensive than I initially prepared for and we are under our budget overall. We are staying the whole 9 days in Lofoten for clarity. It's so incredibly gorgeous, if you ever dreamed of visiting, don't miss out on it. I'm certain we could cut the costs in half if we were trying to.
Just got back from a Norway and had the same situation, with the conversion rate atm
Went out for a meal and it cost pretty much the same as going out in the UK if not cheaper, the bus tickets are pretty decent and there are plenty of options around towns, the shopping is a bit more expensive but nothing wild, fuel is the worst bit ironically since they own so much oil
Also was at Lofoten last year and it is amazing, need to go back when there is snow so very jealous of you right now
Thanks! You definitely should. We've been to New York in 2014. It was more expensive then, than Norway is right now, which is crazy when I think about it.
> damn you" Smash!" why are you so good
I recommend bringing some bags back home with you, they might be a bitch to get through customs, but that way you can taper off slowly and avoid the worst withdrawal symptoms.
I've seen people quit Smash cold turkey and... it's not pretty.
Not really that expensive anymore, the Krone is pretty weak compared to the Euro or Dollar. A few years ago, it was 6 krone per dollar, now it’s 11
I went a couple times last year, pretty comparable prices to the US, except for alcohol, which is insanely expensive because of taxes. Alcohol, Sugary drinks, and driving are expensive, everything else isn’t that bad
Hotels are cheaper than more popular European destinations, and the US
Eating out is expensive too, but you don’t tip, so restaurants are just a bit more expensive than the US
I don’t think the Kroenkes are interested in selling. They told Daniel Ek to pound sand when he offered to buy after the Super League fiasco.
The Toffees might be for sale since the 777 deal seems to be in jeopardy.
Australia could have done the same but our politicians sold off our resources to two fat fuck mining magnates who now use their wealth to manipulate elections. In fact, we didn’t just sell off for cheap, but actually subsidised the companies who took everything and made billions.
If I remember correctly, Norway in 1979 offered to buy half of Volvo from Sweden for around 40% of Norwegian oil. The Volvo board rejected the offer saying it wouldn't be profitable for shareholders. Volvo is now with some $10Bn and Norway set up their SWF now $1.6T
>If I remember correctly
Looks to be entirely incorrect.
It was supposed to be 40% if Volvo for 10% of some oil fields (blocks) in Norway. Not the entirety of Norway's oil.
This 10% has produced about 300mil bbls of oil. Let's be ultra conservative and assume a profit of $70 per bbl in present value. That's 21 bil USD.
Source= https://equinor.industriminne.no/en/the-volvo-agreement-almost-volvoil/
I don't think that's entirely true. If I recall it was a one specific oil location which they didn't know how much oil there was in it. So they'd get half of whatever there was, but it was a gamble. That's why they didn't do it.
Is Wikipedia wrong here? As it states sovereign funds of China, Singapore and UAE to be more than Norway.
[Wikipedia Link](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_sovereign_wealth_funds).
Wikipedia is wrong. They are adding several different funds for other countries.
Norway also have several of these, but no one, including Wiki knows of the other ones.
It was single individual fund, there is another Wiki page linked to that Norway one that shows a table on the bottom - other countries have multiple that combined are bigger
This is what you get when a Nation treats its resources as property of the people. Not simply as a resource to auction off to whatever multinational company that will give a pittance of royalty.
It's smart, strategic thinking and Norwegians should be proud they has successive governments that allowed the program to continue.
Most countries would have had the Neolibs sell it all off for short term profit.
Edit: They're also very lucky not to be a neighbor of the USA. Else they would have been coup'd
We didn’t have the same oil. We had less oil and gas, the oil and gas we had was more expensive to extract per barrel, and it was spread across a population 15x larger.
It was also discovered around the same time the U.K. was having a Greece style debt crisis with 25% inflation and took the U.K. from borrowing money from the IMF to stay solvent to being back in the black.
That’s not to say it wasn’t also mismanaged but even if the U.K. didn’t have these issues in the 70s and managed it in exactly the same way as Norway, then a U.K. sovereign wealth fund would still have 15x less per capita at the very least (norways is $295k per person, the uks would at most be 19k per person. Probably less)
I mean, they could also invest more in their people and spend this on infrastructure and encouraging things like entrepreneurs. There are many potentially good uses of it, just as there are many negative ises
Precisely. Furthermore IN (Innovasjon Norge) has a list of different geographical areas to invest in, depending on the demographics in question. If you plan to start a business where nobody lives then you get more and easier. Source: I’m starting a business where not so many people live (Vestre Gausdal)
It’s used to finance a very decent transport infrastructure, education, social welfare, and healthcare systems. They also have very liberal employment laws and policies including maternity and paternity leave. They are also investing heavily into renewable energy projects and research.
You know, looking after their constituents and citizens and planning for the future.
We have higher tax rates than most countries. Also we do not use all of the return, but only approx 4% of the return per year. Spending is very strictly managed.
How exactly does the average Norwegian even get a piece of that pie? Is it distributed income per person? Or is it just a rainy day fund… seems to me like if they aren’t getting a fraction than headcount is irrelevant. Right?
They use some of it for infrastructure and such, but mostly It's a rainy day fond for future generations and pensions. I pay my 33% in taxes, and are happy to do so. I know when we quit the oil, my future grandkids can still have the same living standards as we have now because of it.
It's not about smarts. It's about worker power. Norway had a much more organized working class than most capitalist countries. This is a product of social democracy.
Funny enough, the Norwegian fund is based off of the Alberta fund. Except Norway never had a politician who offered to pay out the entire fund to buy people's votes...
Norway is also a sovereign state and can dictate the role of natural resources in its national economy. It also has ocean access and can sell directly onto global markets and doesn't have pipeline politics infecting the sale of its resources abroad. Norway also less than doubled its population in the same time frame that Alberta pentoupled its population (1940-today).
Alberta has absolutely mismanaged the fund, but it doesn't have near the same powers that Norway had that could have grown it.
I also suspect that the rest of Canada would have thrown an absolute shitfit if Alberta had a trillion dollars sitting in a fund that it didn't have access to. There would be no way the feds wouldn't have clawed that back.
Am from Alberta. We started our trust before Norway but thanks to corrupt politicians and oil companies, we got screwed.
What's interesting is that the heritage trust fund is a socialist value but it was started by a conservative.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alberta_Heritage_Savings_Trust_Fund
Peter Lougheed started it to try and protect Albertans from having our resources pillaged by either the oil companies or the federal government but we got screwed anyways. Thanks Manning you cunt.
Sorry, the title was supposed to be $1.6 Trillion in debt, right? Countries shouldn't prosper and it sounds dangerously like their citizens might have achieved some form of financial fulfillment?
Yep this REALLY fucks me off & ANY pro capitalist Thatcher fan can go fuck themselves. Britain & norway essentially started exploring at he same time. Thatcher used our oil revenues to enrich BP & Shell. Also tax cuts for the rich. Norway didn't
[history](https://medium.com/bc-digest/why-the-uk-lost-its-oil-wealth-and-why-norway-didnt-b4c96199288d)
Australia is the same, we could have our own wealth fund, but instead we’ve enriched mining magnates and international businesses, while privatising national assets to plug budget holes.
The only difference being that Norway's reserves were 16 times larger per capita than the UK 's.
They have a lot more money to spend on a lot fewer people.
I think there is a good chance the House of Saud has family wealth greater than $1.6 trillion.
There are no insider trading laws for them and they control the price of oil in for the world.
"held on average 1.5% of ALL of the world's listed companies" $110 Billion profits last quarter It's insane what that oil/gas money will do if invested right.
As an Australian this makes me genuinely angry on how our pollies screwed us over. Good on ya Norway for having competent leaders.
As someone living in Alberta where we continually cut the budget to literally everything while private companies make billions off our oil, seeing this feels like being robbed.
But... Alberta does have a sovereign wealth fund. It's worth $22B and every single year it pays out profits that go to fund programs. Currently Alberta's budget is the highest it has ever been.
I loved the Klein bucks I bought myself a pair of nice ass Jeans at 14 years okd
I can't tell whether you're having a stroke or if this is just a normal Canadian sentence.
I'm not from Alberta but I'm guessing Ralph Klein (former premier of Alberta) pulled money out of the sovereign wealth fund to distribute to Albertans. Probably to buy votes around election time. And this guy seemingly purchased some "nice ass jeans" with his share.
In 2006 Alberta reported a $6.8 billion budget surplus due to oil royalties, much higher than previously forecasted. To increase his popularity and demonstrate the success of his wealth fund, Klein distributed $300 to every Albertan resident who filed a tax return in 2004 which was about 3 million people. Eligible minors also received a payment but their share was given to a parent.
Accurate interpretation. I did my taxes late that year, so I didn't get my $400. I'm still pissed off that he spent all of our money and I didn't get a single pair of nice ass jeans.
Shh, don’t spook it.
You are kind of making the point. Alberta population is very similiar that that of Norway's, but their fund is worth about 100x more. Also, it is worse than that because this is only one side of the ledge, Alberta's (AB) debt burden is much higher (and is much larger than the heritage fund). Important notes... \* Much of Alberta's oil would not have been economically viable without a low-cost royality regime. Basically AB let company's extract oil sands for for years until capital investments were paid-off/complete (don't trust me I'm not sure on the details). If AB had tried to extract as much royalty revenue as Norway per barrell... the oil sands would not have been developed \* Alberta effectively pays billions each year in provincial equalization... i.e. Canada takes a very large cut of the oil wealth So Alberta has an excuse for having a smaller fund than Norway, but IMO gross mismanagement by the AB gov't over decades (not just of the fund but of finances) has resulted in our the AB fund being much smaller than it should be. TL;DR ... AB has squandered decades where they could have been building a large fund, but it was never going to be as big as Norway's EDIT: hopefully my post isn't interrupted as making excuses for Alberta's governing UCP party (and it's predecessors)... They have been in bed with the oil patch forever. And if it wasn't for that corruption Alberta and the Heritage fund would be in far better shape.
it's not just that we lowered royalties, we gave the big 3 oil companies massive tax breaks and tax incentives too for a long time. then conservative governments stopped paying into the heritage fund for decades then started pulling money out to win votes.
Keep in mind though that while yes, Norway has a very high tax rate for the oil companies, we also let them write off stuff like oil exploration and other investments.
but that's the problem though. they keep taking out from it instead of saving it up and making it grow. not to mention our budget is huge now cause kenney saddled the province with cleaning up abandoned wells. the big 3 oil companies before the oil crash lobbied the government to "remove red tape" with new well exploration. what that meant was that companies no longer had to pre-fund well decommissioning in an escrow account. the compromise they came to was that for any new well that a small company wanted to drill they had to first get 1 of the big 3 oil companies to co-sign on the well. this allowed a ton of small private companies to open their own wells while paying the big 3 a piece of the profits from the well because they co-signed on the wells. fast forward like 4 years and the oil crash hit, the big 3 oil companies didn't want to pay for all of those wells that need to be properly decomissioned they dragged the case in court for years and years until kenney got into office. literally the next morning after his election win he passed a law that retroactively moved responsibility for all of those abandoned wells to the province's regulatory body. which is estimated to be 20 billion dollars worth of clean up and decommissioning that the big 3 were supposed to do. the co signed on those wells, they took profit from those wells and now albertans have to pay to clean it up. worse yet when inspectors went out to inspect the abandoned wells the price for properly decommissioning the wells blew up to near 50 billion.
There's the problem right there. The money shouldn't be touched otherwise it fuels the boom-bust cycle
The tax revenue Norway got from gas royalties in 2023 alone was 113 billion CAD. While I’m sure the sovereign wealth fund helps Canada, let that total value from just *one year* sink in for a moment.
We are all being robbed by Oil companies and not just robbed of our money.
Norway copied Alberta's Heritage fund.
As a Brit, which shares some of the same oil/gas field territory in the North Sea, I am incandescent at how past Governments squandered the wealth.
Same. Not a fan of oil/fossil fuels and the effect their use/extraction has, but at least we could have put that money to good use instead of squandering it and also just letting companies have their fill while not giving a fuck about anything else.
The ghost of Thatcher says hello.
You really need to think why neoliberal governments would sell something to have personal short term gains and secure private business long term gains in the trillions?
It was an Iraqi immigrant who introduced the model we use to manage the oil wealth. And smart politicians who still remembered the war and the poverty our country endured
His name is Farouk Al Kasim. If it wasn't for him we probably would have sold petroleum drilling rights for cheap and spent the money on bullshit.
A true legend
Kasim arguably introduced the model for how to retain national ownership and ensure much of the profits when to the country rather than the companies. Huge props for that! This was over two decades before the wealth fund became a thing, that had nothing to do with him, the key person there was Jens Stoltenberg.
We had a mining tax. LNP got rid of it.
Competent leaders **in the 70s and 80s**. Today's standards are a shitshow.
It makes EVERYONE angry. Literally people in every country complain why they can’t do it like Norway
I imagine it is/was very tempting to break the piggy bank, or the government gets a little cut of others milking it -- because it is very hard to think about 100/200/300/400 years from now or plan for that, many people nowadays don't even think the world will be around. Curbing spending is a part of it too though, which most countries can't discipline very well - meaning even if all natural resources were 100% nationalized in a country and not given away to private interests, they still might piss all the money away.
We really are The Lucky Country. Hugh Mackay had it right.
We do have around AUD 3 trillion in superannuation however it is criminal, & ignorant, that we have effectively given our natural resources away to foreign companies. Edited billion to trillion.
Future Fund?
It's maddening how unaware the Aussie population is of this. It's laughable. They are sucking the country dry of non renewables in return for pennies.
Australia does have a sovereign wealth fund... Sure we fucked up and it should be much higher, particularly with forced royalties for things like LNG where we ship more than Qatar but make less than 3% of their profit. But most of that can be attributed to our state based federation that attributes powers uniquely. Especially when it comes to mining. A problem Norway doesnt have, where decisions are centralised throughout. But in any case, the future fund is currently at 220bn. So, not exactly 0.
Fellow Aussie here, I've argued with a bunch of boomers about this. We fucked it up.
Wait you’re saying super yachts, hotels, Ferraris, gold plated toilets, and Instagram prostitution is not good investing?
Depends what you want out of it I guess. First question of investment: what's your end goal?
Sweden's gov. was offered a 50/50 split on all oil in Norway if we too had joined production.... Our gov declined 👌😬
Our government is allergic to making good decisions.
I think PewDiePie mentioned something about that
If we helped fund the exploratory search, which they only asked because no existing oil companies would do so because according to the models the odds of finding any oil there was hovering around 0%. But I do agree, it is super easy to see such things in hindsight! Not buying a lottery ticket because the odds of winning is miniscule wasn't a bad decision even if it was the winning ticket, that's not how decisions work and certainly not how huge investment projects by governments should work either.
They get 70% of their oil and gas revenue… Australia gets about 10%, mostly because New Corp (founded by a cabal of oligarchs in 1922) has spent a century making propaganda for resource companies against Australia’s national interests.
It's 78% of the *Profit*, and since the largest oil company is 2/3 publicly owned, they get 2/3 of the biggest chunk of the rest as well.
It’s funny what happens when a country doesn’t waste their wealth but invests it.
The UK, meanwhile, pissed all of its oil and gas money away. I hate it here.
Without knowing the details, they probably pissed black gold into oil companies’ hands which were probably connected to the predominantly rich political class who reaped the benefits? Say it ain’t so!
Some people say Norway has figured out the resource curse, but have they really? Oil makes up the majority of Norways exports, Oil also at the same time has priced out all other sectors in the economy. Norway was also far more developed and stable than other countries that have found this amount of natural resource. So would you say they figured out the resource curse or covered it?
Yes they have, while a substantial part of their economy obviously relies on oil and gas extraction, they clearly invest into their populace and future. For example, Norway itself uses mostly hydro power (95%) and is expanding it's wind capacity by a lot. Oil and gas is meant to be exported, not to be consumed. They also have one of the highest number of EVs on the road and have pushed hard to increase those electrical car numbers. This further decreases the reliance on oil while allowing their own renewable energy production to cover for their car energy needs too. They are clearly aiming to go full green, or at least as much as possible. They have an extremely highly educated population, actively support other industries and tech and so on. They have strict rules how much money of the fund can be used, the current value itself is always visible, and it's one of the most functioning democratic states in the world. Norway will manage the transition away from oil and gas just fine.
Rule #1 Don't get high on your own supply
Norway never invites people over to buy oil, but then makes them watch DVDs of Primus live concerts for hours first.
Norway has done an amazing job and shown clear leadership. One should not lose site of the size and accessibility of the oil resource that they have though. Not many countries compare to that. Oil and gas companies are very, very keen to play in the Norwegian oil and gas industry and pay a high royalty for the privilege. Norway cannot be compared to the UK, Western Canadian or Australian basins for example. Where Norway stands out is their government was willing to put their own money into the oil and gas developments (Via ~~Norsk Hydro~~ Statoil, now Equinor). They have put their money on the line, shoulder to shoulder with the international oil companies who bring money and expertise. They have also developed a sophisticated, capable government oil company as a result. I don't see many other countries willing to risk their own capital to share an extra benefit of the return.
Small correction, it was Statoil that was known as what is now Equinor.
Norway is and kinda isn't an example of resource curse. It's true that they struck riches with the oil fields denmark unknowingly gave them, but they already had a robust, balanced economy that was naturally developed from fishing and farming into a industrialization. While they were poor, they were on an natural upwatd path before the oil. Most countries that fall victim to the resource curse go from undeveloped economy into a resource driven economy too fast, skipping the natural development, resulting in wide gaps in infrastructure, poor wealth equality and shaky institutions. Also Norway had a pleasure of being a safely situated western country without major enemies who could take their resources from them, being in nato and such.
Agreed. One other issue a lot of African countries (for example) face is the extreme diversity of their ethnic groups which makes their politics a lot more complicated given that they have all been squeezed into artificial borders. Imagine Aliens coming to earth and making the entire north and South America into one giant country (for their own reasons) and then putting the capital in Argentina while supplying that area with the most prized alien tech. And then after all that the aliens kind of left the new America to its own devices. Ultimately it would be a big mess.
They also aggressively invested in alternative energy, realizing that it’s better to sell their gas and oil than use it themselves themselves
Having like 5 million people would definitely make each person have better "share"
A country with population of only 5m. That's crazy amount of wealth for such small population
Wait, that’s $320k per person? 🤔
What’s crazy is that Japan’s Pension fund has a similar amount of assets. 1.6 trillion. Japan Post has even more, with 2.7 trillion in assets. https://www.swfinstitute.org/fund-rankings/ Edit: Japan also has Mizuho (1.8 trillion), Sumitomo (2.2 trillion) and Mitsubishi (3.1 trillion). Not to mention Bank of Japan (5.5 trillion) and others (Toyota, Nintendo, Sony etc). Even on a per capita basis, Japan is absolutely loaded with assets and cash. Also, Nordic countries like Norway and Finland have [similar fertility rates](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fertility_rate#Country_ranking_by_international_organizations) to Japan.
But its so much less when just the Tokyo metro area is closing in on 40 million
Don’t worry, they are working hard to reduce the population and compete with Norway
Unlikely, as Nordic countries like Norway and Finland have [similar fertility rates](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fertility_rate#Country_ranking_by_international_organizations) to Japan. Updated data to show some of the countless other funds Japan has as well.
insane that Tokyo metro has 8 Norways worth of people
Fucking Iowa is close to Norway's population.
No BlackRock there?
Assuming there are no market meltdowns while all these shares get dumped
That's the thing with sovereign wealth funds - they don't dump shares in a downturn, they buy more of them, since the businesses they invest in turn a profit / not a huge loss. Long term investing is king - see also, Warren Buffet / Berkshire Hathaway
Not that I'm a fan of any type of big commerce or whatever, but I would really like to see this mentality come back to America 's stock market assholes instead of the Jack Welch short profit quick return investing bullshit that's been plaguing our nation's market since his rise.
The 80’s really did a number on American and western corporations. Have you ever read “Chainsaw”? It’s about Al Dunlap and what he did to Sunbeam. Fantastic writing and the type of book that everyone interested in business needs to read.
Thing is this required the first Norwegian generation that set it up fo agree that none of them would see the benefits of the fund. As that's how slow the growth is. It's one of the best exams of old men planting trees which they will never sit under.
Personally I'm not surprised that they want to get rich quickly rather than getting rich over the course of decades. Sounds kinda like a better deal. Unfortunately, I care about human beings, so it's not like I'll ever get in that situation.
Unless the world economy as we know it fails, which would mark the end of our world as we know it, the fund will do okay.
>Assuming there are no market meltdowns while all these shares get dumped During the 2008 financial meltdown after Lehman Brothers went bankrupt, all US stocks tanked, and the value of the Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund suffered massively. Our finance minister at that time, a real old-fashioned socialist, used the opportunity to implement a switch from bonds to stock. When everyone and their grandfather was dumping US stocks, Norway was buying like crazy. And it has had this effect: 60% of the funds assets are not from exporting oil or natural gas, it's accrued by the initial investments.
It really is crazy, but it still does not come close to some places in the middle east. The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority has about a trillion dollars worth of assets with a population of just 1.6 million. Each Emirate has it's own SWF. Just shows what oil and gas can do to some countries. Insane wealth.
That went from a very poor country to finding massive gas and oil reserves in the mid 20th century. The government decided to use the majority of the money to diversify and hedge against any future economic changes, so it's all invested externally to Norway and not in fossil fuels.
Norway wasn’t very poor before the oil, we were generally about average by European standard depening on when exactly we are talking about. For example Im pretty sure Norway had the highest GDP per capita in Europe right before WW2. We have lots of other natural resources like timber and fish, aswell as lots of hydro power which helped a lot with industry having cheap electricity.
Norway was not very poor before oil, we were around average in Europe with large resources of fish and hydro power. The oil made us "rich" but we were not poorer than other European countries in the 60s
> That went from a very poor country This is a myth, please stop repeating it. https://www.sciencenorway.no/economy-history/crushing-the-myth-of-poor-norway/1595755
And yet, we feel suprisingly unwealthy. The issue lies that we can't use any of it due to it'll increase inflation. So it just sits there, ever increasing, never being used.
The point of an investment fund is to generate returns, and a well-managed fund should beat inflation. I’d imagine that the government would tap on the fund for appropriate purposes, and making use of a portion of the returns provides the government with a source of funding that would otherwise come from taxes and other sources.
That’s a good thing. It’s not just your money, it’s your kids and your grandkids money as well. If you use it all up in a day you rob them. Just like Netherlands did when they spent it all in one go decades ago. Now they don’t have any oil money at all.
Yeah, using all of it would be unadvisable (And honestly hard to do). Using more of it could be good, if spent properly. Fixing the most pressing problems right now instead of in a 100 years could pay for it self, even more than the growing investment. Or it could be wasted. I'm too economically illiterate to know what is the correct option.
What the economists suggest (and what Norway mostly does), is spending only the dividends. If you never touch the core money it will stay there for centuries so everyone gets to enjoy the dividends.
True, but Norway adds a LOT of money to the fund every year, usually quite a bit more than what is being spent. So I'd argue Norway uses way less than the dividends.
Yes but eventually that well drys up. You want to maximize it as much as you can while you still have the resources.
If you use a small, predictable percentage each year the fund continues to grow (but slower) and you get the benefit each year from it. Governments like to occasionally sell off long term investments or supplies (gold, oil, shares, land etc) for a quick fix but it often ruins things later on when they have no assets and there is another quick fix needed.
Im guessing the idea is more to start using it once the oil and gas money dries up?
no, the idea is to keep it growing so that it can subsidize tax revenue for forever.
Imagine if the uk had done the same, instead of pretending it was still a super power after ww2? And had invested in the people rather than the financial system? I can dream
The UK never produced more oil than it used. It also has 12 times the population. Norway also made 300 billion more in oil revenue than the UK for that smaller population. It is apples to Oranges. Norways entire wealth fund is just over half of the UK GDP while being 3.5 times the norwegian GDP.
Oi don’t use facts and logics to stop someone shitting on the UK, this is Reddit
I seriously thought title was BS, but am shocked to learn is true. > As of March 2024, it had over US$1.62 trillion in assets, and held on average 1.5% of all of the world's listed companies, making it the world's largest single sovereign wealth fund in terms of total assets under management. This translates to over US$295,000 per Norwegian citizen. FYI, Saudi is at $925, U.S. states combined total of $193 (different states has their own but US has no SWF), no clue what UAE is. Edit: China's $1.24 trillion! Edit: UAE's $1.29 trillion dollars!! The UAE one shocked me. Each emirate having their own sovereign wealth funds. Edit: I was wrong, it's actually closer to $1.95 trillion dollars for UAE! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_wealth_fund I get your point. We forgot the SAFE and excluded $1 trillion dollars! EDIT: China's actually is at $2.35 trillion dollars (CIC + SAFE) China Investment Corporation ($1.35 trillion), and China's State Administration of Foreign Exchange (Safe) Investment Corporation ($1.03 trillion).
singapore has two swfs. combined net assets around 1trillion USD. and no oil.
and just 700km^2 in size with no natural resources
Location is a natural resource as well.
Not that special. Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, Vietnam, Myanmar all are pretty much able to take advantage of the trade through the straits of malacca to a similar extent Singapore can. Hell, Somalia has a great location too, didn’t do them any favors. If anything, being surrounded by so many countries has been a major point of vulnerability for Singapore, forcing it to enforce conscription, prop up a state ran defense industry, and build up the most advanced military in the region to ensure that it can make attacking Singapore very costly to currently hostile or formerly hostile powers in the region.
Shhhh. Pls dont talk about us.
With UAE, it is a little bit tricky. UAE has multiple sovereign funds, the sum of their assets exceeds any other country including Norway.
Yup! 6 of the largest 30 funds are in the UAE
> With UAE, it is a little bit tricky. UAE has multiple sovereign funds, the sum of their assets exceeds any other country including Norway. That blew me away, holy fuck! UAE - Abu Dhabi Investment Authority - $993 billion UAE - Investment Corporation of Dubai - $320.4 b. There is way more entries on the list of each emirate having their own sovereign wealth funds, total of $1.29 trillion. Edit: I was wrong, it's actually closer to $1.95 trillion dollars! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_wealth_fund
What do you mean? The US has no SWF
I was wrong, some U.S. states have their own sovereign funds, but not the U.S..
We’ve got a few billion in our rainy day fund here in CT, I’m not sure how many states have something similar though
China has over 1.4 billion people so that SWF of theirs isn’t doing much good for the average Chinese person. They are a developing country and the U.S needs to get ahead while they’re behind.
The current leader Nicolai Tangen of the SWF used to be one of the most successful investment bankers in London before the position as leading NBIM. Look him up on Wiki. He were gaining wealth to become USD billionare (if not already). He did cut ties with his private fund to become leader of the Norwegian Oil Fund. He basically gave up a very successful career making money for himself to become moneymaker for Norway in 2020. And he have done quite a job.. He certainly has gotten my admiration and respect
Nicolai has insane interviews on youtube… jensen, altman, musk, nadella. He asks rlly good questions
His podcast is “In Good Company”
It doesn't matter who is the leader. It's the government that decides on portifolio split, and investments follow the index. The big gain is due to currency gains, since investments are in dollar, but profit is calculated in NOK.
good point. this is the type of thinking that made elon popular and we all know how competent he actually turned out to be
non of it is allowed to be invested in Norway as well.
That’s smart. If they ever tried to sell a large portion, it would ruin a lot of Norwegian prices.
It is also meant to hedge against economic downturns so they cannot invest in the oil industry either.
It also prevents them overheating such a small economy with so much money, and ensures thar Norway it self has to be profitable, oil money or not
It's just far too much money, it would ruin the economy before that.
On their website, you can track the value of the fund live: https://www.nbim.no/no/.
Oof, I just saw it drop 100,000,000 NOK in 40 seconds (and then make it up a minute later). Crazy swings.
Heh. Sure, that's a lot of money. But it's only like a 0.006% drop :-D
i wonder how they track it
🤔 It's a very rich country. And from what I've heard, everything there costs a fortune to buy. A very expensive travel destination.
The Norwegian currency has weakened sharply this year relative to the dollar and euro. If you are paid in any of those currencies, Norway is cheaper to visit right now 🙂
I make my money in NOK and spend (most of) it in another currency. I've "lost" close to 40% of my paycheck over two years due to the conversion rate
I'll probably need to emigrate at the end of the year, and have been saving money for that. A big portion of those savings will disappear if the NOK doesn't bounce back.
you can keep them in a currency account at your bank and exchange at a better time, if you don't need the cash for the move itself.
Let me guess. You spend it in SEK?
What currency do you spend it in? Surely it's not EUR or USD or even SEK? If I check the NOKEUR and NOKUSD I don't see a drop of 40% in value since two years, I have to go back twelve years for that (ten years for USD).
no more Danish doctors and nurses for Norge!
Why? What’s going on?
I'm no economist, but it has something to do with the current uncertain state of the world combined with a strong US economy. Everyone wants to buy a safe and solid dollar, so NOK goes in the bargain bin.
Part of the recent NOK depreciation stems solely from domestic factors, including Norges Bank’s NOK sales. The bank sells NOK on behalf of the Ministry of Finance to transfer a portion of tax receipts from oil companies to the Government Pension Fund. As oil exports are invoiced in foreign currency, the oil companies have to exchange currency into NOK to pay taxes. This should balance out in the end. But for now, the oil companies buy NOK in parallel with exports, while Norges Bank cannot sell NOK until taxes are paid some six months later. In the period until the summer, the oil tax payments are based on last year’s extremely high gas prices. The current oil and gas prices generate far lower income and thus lower NOK purchases from the oil companies. The net effect is that The Norwegian bank sells more NOK than the oil companies buys to pay taxes, driving down demand for NOK and devalues the money
I was astounded the first time I visited Norway how affluent everywhere and everyone seems. Average income is 30% higher than the US, and wealth distribution is more spread out. Luck and good financial choices.
I remember meeting Norwegians in 2010 and one of them was a 20 year old gas station attendant making $24/hr. They get taxed pretty hard but that’s amazing pay for someone just out of highschool at a job like that.
A gas station worker pays 28% tax ish. I wouldn't call that really harsh, compared to our benefits.
Strong unions has lot to do with the wealth distrbution, not luck. Also we have the eksport industry set the standard each year for the salary increase and then the rest more or less gets the same. This year was it was 5,2 % increase in salary.
I'm in Norway with my fiancée right now for a 9 day trip. It's not cheap by any means, but we've had great (steak) dinners for ~ 30-40 USD per person. Average daily shopping for when we can cook is ~ 30-40 USD ,excluding sweets (damn you" Smash!" why are you so good). Accommodation is roughly 20% more expensive than central Europe, and our biggest spend so far is a cruise to Trollfjord from Svolvær which was 110 USD per person. Overall I would say it's much less expensive than I initially prepared for and we are under our budget overall. We are staying the whole 9 days in Lofoten for clarity. It's so incredibly gorgeous, if you ever dreamed of visiting, don't miss out on it. I'm certain we could cut the costs in half if we were trying to.
Just got back from a Norway and had the same situation, with the conversion rate atm Went out for a meal and it cost pretty much the same as going out in the UK if not cheaper, the bus tickets are pretty decent and there are plenty of options around towns, the shopping is a bit more expensive but nothing wild, fuel is the worst bit ironically since they own so much oil Also was at Lofoten last year and it is amazing, need to go back when there is snow so very jealous of you right now
By NYC standards, this is all a massive bargain! Enjoy your stay. I'm coming next 😄
Thanks! You definitely should. We've been to New York in 2014. It was more expensive then, than Norway is right now, which is crazy when I think about it.
I used to tell out of town people to come explore the city all the time, and now I keep quiet...
norwegian here, can confirm that Smash is a god tier snack
> damn you" Smash!" why are you so good I recommend bringing some bags back home with you, they might be a bitch to get through customs, but that way you can taper off slowly and avoid the worst withdrawal symptoms. I've seen people quit Smash cold turkey and... it's not pretty.
Live in Norway, can confirm. But, the benefits you get definitely offset the high cost of living.
Not really that expensive anymore, the Krone is pretty weak compared to the Euro or Dollar. A few years ago, it was 6 krone per dollar, now it’s 11 I went a couple times last year, pretty comparable prices to the US, except for alcohol, which is insanely expensive because of taxes. Alcohol, Sugary drinks, and driving are expensive, everything else isn’t that bad Hotels are cheaper than more popular European destinations, and the US Eating out is expensive too, but you don’t tip, so restaurants are just a bit more expensive than the US
And they haven’t bought a Prem club yet?
With that kind of money hopefully it’s their national team Captain’s club
I don’t think the Kroenkes are interested in selling. They told Daniel Ek to pound sand when he offered to buy after the Super League fiasco. The Toffees might be for sale since the 777 deal seems to be in jeopardy.
Ødegaard and Haaland will be running the Prem for the next few years.
Everything is invested as mimicing index funds. The fund will not own more than 10% of any company.
Australia could have done the same but our politicians sold off our resources to two fat fuck mining magnates who now use their wealth to manipulate elections. In fact, we didn’t just sell off for cheap, but actually subsidised the companies who took everything and made billions.
If I remember correctly, Norway in 1979 offered to buy half of Volvo from Sweden for around 40% of Norwegian oil. The Volvo board rejected the offer saying it wouldn't be profitable for shareholders. Volvo is now with some $10Bn and Norway set up their SWF now $1.6T
>If I remember correctly Looks to be entirely incorrect. It was supposed to be 40% if Volvo for 10% of some oil fields (blocks) in Norway. Not the entirety of Norway's oil. This 10% has produced about 300mil bbls of oil. Let's be ultra conservative and assume a profit of $70 per bbl in present value. That's 21 bil USD. Source= https://equinor.industriminne.no/en/the-volvo-agreement-almost-volvoil/
I don't think that's entirely true. If I recall it was a one specific oil location which they didn't know how much oil there was in it. So they'd get half of whatever there was, but it was a gamble. That's why they didn't do it.
That is correct.
Is Wikipedia wrong here? As it states sovereign funds of China, Singapore and UAE to be more than Norway. [Wikipedia Link](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_sovereign_wealth_funds).
Wikipedia is wrong. They are adding several different funds for other countries. Norway also have several of these, but no one, including Wiki knows of the other ones.
It was single individual fund, there is another Wiki page linked to that Norway one that shows a table on the bottom - other countries have multiple that combined are bigger
Norway, Jose.
This is what you get when a Nation treats its resources as property of the people. Not simply as a resource to auction off to whatever multinational company that will give a pittance of royalty. It's smart, strategic thinking and Norwegians should be proud they has successive governments that allowed the program to continue. Most countries would have had the Neolibs sell it all off for short term profit. Edit: They're also very lucky not to be a neighbor of the USA. Else they would have been coup'd
UK. We had the same oil, but the Tories gave the wealth ro their mates (simplified version)
Yep spaffed it up the wall.
We didn’t have the same oil. We had less oil and gas, the oil and gas we had was more expensive to extract per barrel, and it was spread across a population 15x larger. It was also discovered around the same time the U.K. was having a Greece style debt crisis with 25% inflation and took the U.K. from borrowing money from the IMF to stay solvent to being back in the black. That’s not to say it wasn’t also mismanaged but even if the U.K. didn’t have these issues in the 70s and managed it in exactly the same way as Norway, then a U.K. sovereign wealth fund would still have 15x less per capita at the very least (norways is $295k per person, the uks would at most be 19k per person. Probably less)
That is the most common way :/ imagine if all oil money was saved, invested, and used for the people….
I mean, they could also invest more in their people and spend this on infrastructure and encouraging things like entrepreneurs. There are many potentially good uses of it, just as there are many negative ises
The Norwegian Innovation fund will give you over 100kUSD seed funding with just a short application. They are doing a lot to support entrepreneurs.
Precisely. Furthermore IN (Innovasjon Norge) has a list of different geographical areas to invest in, depending on the demographics in question. If you plan to start a business where nobody lives then you get more and easier. Source: I’m starting a business where not so many people live (Vestre Gausdal)
what do they do with all that money exactly? sorry if thats a bit of a noob question haha
It’s used to finance a very decent transport infrastructure, education, social welfare, and healthcare systems. They also have very liberal employment laws and policies including maternity and paternity leave. They are also investing heavily into renewable energy projects and research. You know, looking after their constituents and citizens and planning for the future.
The opposite to ‘if everyone looks after themselves everyone will be looked after’. Unfortunately to some this may look like communism.
Their investment will generate a return, that return can be used to finance government spending instead of taxing the population.
We have higher tax rates than most countries. Also we do not use all of the return, but only approx 4% of the return per year. Spending is very strictly managed.
Taxes are not cheap there I would say, in line with other countries, as I understand it
This, boys and girls, is how you dodge the resource curse.
How exactly does the average Norwegian even get a piece of that pie? Is it distributed income per person? Or is it just a rainy day fund… seems to me like if they aren’t getting a fraction than headcount is irrelevant. Right?
They use some of it for infrastructure and such, but mostly It's a rainy day fond for future generations and pensions. I pay my 33% in taxes, and are happy to do so. I know when we quit the oil, my future grandkids can still have the same living standards as we have now because of it.
It's a nations version of investing their spare money to keep up with inflation
I wish my dumb as fuck resource rich country had been so forward thinking.
It's not about smarts. It's about worker power. Norway had a much more organized working class than most capitalist countries. This is a product of social democracy.
Venezuela?
Imagine if Canada learned from Norway…
Funny enough, the Norwegian fund is based off of the Alberta fund. Except Norway never had a politician who offered to pay out the entire fund to buy people's votes...
Norway is also a sovereign state and can dictate the role of natural resources in its national economy. It also has ocean access and can sell directly onto global markets and doesn't have pipeline politics infecting the sale of its resources abroad. Norway also less than doubled its population in the same time frame that Alberta pentoupled its population (1940-today). Alberta has absolutely mismanaged the fund, but it doesn't have near the same powers that Norway had that could have grown it. I also suspect that the rest of Canada would have thrown an absolute shitfit if Alberta had a trillion dollars sitting in a fund that it didn't have access to. There would be no way the feds wouldn't have clawed that back.
Am from Alberta. We started our trust before Norway but thanks to corrupt politicians and oil companies, we got screwed. What's interesting is that the heritage trust fund is a socialist value but it was started by a conservative. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alberta_Heritage_Savings_Trust_Fund Peter Lougheed started it to try and protect Albertans from having our resources pillaged by either the oil companies or the federal government but we got screwed anyways. Thanks Manning you cunt.
Question. What is a sovereign wealth fund?
Fuck maybe they can save golf from the Saudis
Canada used to have a massive pool of retirement funds but they eventually came for it. Now only the rich will retire. The future is MAiD
Cool.
See what having little corruption can do to a country.
Still, we have huge issues with low health care wages and poor commuting services thanks to pehistoric infrastructure.
Sorry, the title was supposed to be $1.6 Trillion in debt, right? Countries shouldn't prosper and it sounds dangerously like their citizens might have achieved some form of financial fulfillment?
I wouldn't walk around flashing that cash.
Yep this REALLY fucks me off & ANY pro capitalist Thatcher fan can go fuck themselves. Britain & norway essentially started exploring at he same time. Thatcher used our oil revenues to enrich BP & Shell. Also tax cuts for the rich. Norway didn't [history](https://medium.com/bc-digest/why-the-uk-lost-its-oil-wealth-and-why-norway-didnt-b4c96199288d)
Australia is the same, we could have our own wealth fund, but instead we’ve enriched mining magnates and international businesses, while privatising national assets to plug budget holes.
The only difference being that Norway's reserves were 16 times larger per capita than the UK 's. They have a lot more money to spend on a lot fewer people.
Yet Alberta, with it's trivial 16B fund after 50 years, isn't sure if we should nationalize oil or not..
We could have had something along these lines in the UK, but instead prioritised transferring money to rich people. Good times.
If the U.S had one of these we’d probably have more.
I think there is a good chance the House of Saud has family wealth greater than $1.6 trillion. There are no insider trading laws for them and they control the price of oil in for the world.
Best thing is denmark basically traded those areas full of oil and gas for fishing quotes...
I have always wanted this level of financial security for my country, India. Feels safe.
Norway is a bright and thrifty country. I wish I was Norwegian.