Managers of mandatory private pension funds were in for asurprise in February: the number of clients they were allocated aspart of the random distribution system (lottery) climbed by 70%against January, i.e. 32,820 new clients, despite a continued risein unemployment. They are employees aged under 35 who did notchoose a pension fund within four months from starting their firstjob.
The number of clients who chose their own fund was only 2,500, 35%less than in the first month of this year. People who joined aprivate pensions fund on their own accounted for only 7% of theoverall number of new pension fund clients, while the othersresulted from the lottery.
"Maybe some hiring was done in the economy, but it is not verylikely. We really don't know where all these participants comefrom," says Mihai Coca-Cozma, general manager of Alico Pensiipension manager (formerly AIG Pensii).
Very few employees know that they must choose a private pensionfund within four months from being employed in their first job. 2%of an employee's gross salary goes into this fund, a contributionwhich is to be boosted to 2.5% this month.
"Finding eligible clients is very hard to do. (...) Since thecontribution is so small, people are not very interested in privatepension funds. That is why managers don't invest very much inpromotion and in informing people," explains Coca-Cozma.
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