Pension funds, 2003

Only at the national level.

Annual.

Eurostat

Micro data are stored in an Oracle database.

The purpose is to provide statistics for the national accounts, financial sector balances and census of foreign assets and liabilities.

The statistics are included in national accounts, financial sector balances, balance of payments and statistics on Norway's foreign assets and liabilities. Other major users are Norges Bank, The Financial Supervisory Authority of Norway, Ministry of Finance and the media.

Not relevant

The statistics are based on the guidelines in the national accounts standards System of National Accounts (SNA), European System of Accounts (ESA) and the IMF Manual on Monetary and Financial Statistics.

Statistics from the financial institutions are used in the national accounts, financial sector accounts, the balance of payments and in the Norwegian statistics of foreign debt and receivables.

Statistics Act Section 3-2 (banks and finance corporations), Act on the The Financial Supervisory Authority of Norway Sections 1 and 4.

Council regulation 295/2008. Council regulation 251/2009. Amendments to council regulation 295/2008.

Council regulation (EC) no. 2223/96 The regulation covers the European system for national and regional accounts.

Council regulation (EC) no. 1392/2007 Amendments to council regulation 2223/96.

Council regulation (EC) no. 1606/2002 Regulation on the application of international accounting standards.

Council regulation (EC) no. 297/2008 Amendments to council regulation 1606/2002.

The population is all pension funds with lincence from The Financial Supervisory Authority of Norway.

The statistics are based on accounting data from the enterprises.

Total count.

The Financial Supervisory Authority of Norway and Statistics Norway work together to collect the accounting data.

Revision of the pension funds accounting statements are undertaken by Statistics Norway and The Financial Supervisory Authority of Norway.

Not relevant

The analysis is split into two parts, i.e. the sum of all municipal pension funds and the sum of all private pension funds. From 1998 data for pension funds established by municipal enterprises are separated from private pension funds.

The accounting statistics for the financial institutions is based on current accounting regulations for financial institutions. Breaches may therefore occur in connection with changes in accounting legislation and in the regulations applicable to the financial institutions. Structural changes like new companies, mergers and spin-offs, with portfolio movements as one consequence, may also lead to breaches in the time series.

International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS) The new accounting standard IFRS is an example of a change that will cause breaches in the time series in the periods to come. In 2009/2010 all reporting companies must, in one way or another, report according to the IFRS standard, and data may then be fully comparable again. However, the IFRS standard will lead to larger fluctuations in the data because of the more extensive use of fair value in the accounting. The comparison of the reported data with the companies' official accounts is also challenging because the IFRS standard does not require a specific presentation of the accounts, as the traditional Norwegian accounting standard does.

Regulation on loans The IFRS-adapted regulation on loans was introduced 1. January 2005. It lead to a small change in the measuring of the value of loans and guaranties in the accounting data and thereby to a small breach in the time series for loans and loan loss provisions. There were also a breach in the time series on loans in 1992 due to changed accounting rules.

Changes in the presentation of the statistics Credit lines secured on dwellings became a new specification from January 2006. As a consequence the numbers for repayment loans secured on dwellings and credit lines, working capital facility and consumer credit were reduced.

Structural changes There are several mergers, spin-offs and new companies being started every year. Many of these structural changes have no significant impact on the statistics, while others leads to major breaches in the time series. When the latter is the case, it will be commented upon in this section.

Portfolio movements The introduction of IFRS, the regulation on loans and the structural changes mentioned, has lead to portfolio movements especially between banks and mortgage companies. This gives breaches in the time series and needs to be taken into consideration when interpreting the data.