Malaysia provident fund at a crossroads

For the past two years, Watson Wyatt has been researching how Malaysia's M$200 billion ($53 billion) Employees' Provident Fund can reverse declines on its returns on investment, with a final report and recommendation due in March, 2003. The final result is likely to de-emphasize investing abroad and look at ideas such as contracting investment responsibility to companies and workers or creating a private pension plan akin to Thailand's.