PERMODALAN Nasional Bhd (PNB) plans to bolster the performance of its strategic companies by launching a Stewardship Framework that institutionalises governance best practices.
In a virtual press conference on its Annual Report 2019 and Strategic Plan 2020-2022, president/CEO Jalil Rasheed said considering that the performance of these companies significantly impacted its income, PNB would be actively engaging these companies, champion good corporate governance, and exercise its shareholding rights by way of proxy voting.
He said the key components to achieve this included ensuring their strategic planning was in order, encouraging prudent capital allocation that would drive performance in the short- to medium-term, and improving accountability by encouraging companies to publish their key performance indicators transparently.
“We want to be a value-adding partner to our investee companies and minority shareholders. We will advocate on behalf of our investee companies and provide complementary expertise.
“Towards this end, a Strategic Investment Council (SIC) has been established, to be chaired by me and consists of all CEOs of our strategic companies,” he said, adding that the SIC is aimed at aligning interests and reducing duplication where possible, and serves as an avenue for all to share best practices.
Jalil said PNB would also be writing an annual shareholder letter to its strategic and core investment companies which would detail its assessment of the companies’ operating performance.
Meanwhile, group chairman Tan Sri Dr Zeti Akhtar Aziz said for the 2019 financial year, PNB’s assets under management (AUM) recorded a 4.5% growth year-on-year to RM312 bil while net income stood at RM10.7 bil, which contributed to a 5.4 sen payout per unit for the fixed price funds despite the 6% negative return in the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI.
She said the income distribution amounted to a total of RM13.2 bil to its 14.3 million unit holders in 2019.
Moving forward, Zeti said the global economic recovery would depend on how successful the world is in containing the Covid-19 pandemic, the effective implementation of the policy measures that had been introduced, how the post-economic shutdown was managed and when a vaccine might be developed.
In the immediate term, she said businesses are being heavily disrupted, earnings are adversely affected, unemployment is expected to increase and financial markets are highly volatile.
“In these bleak financial and economic conditions, there is, however, some room for optimism. While the necessary economic pain to contain the spread of the pandemic may be intense and immense, it will however be temporary.
“Once the economic shutdown is lifted, economic activity can be reignited. In the immediate time frame, a recession may be felt before the recovery occurs. We therefore need to look beyond the immediate term,” she added. — May 4, 2020, Bernama
