Norway has been awash in "petrokroner" since oil prices started soaring two years ago. Government officials have been stashing most of the money away in a fund meant to sustain the country when its offshore oil reserves eventually run dry.
The fund, formally known as the Government Pension Fund – Global, is still widely known as the "oil fund," and money invested in it grew by another 3.4 percent during the second quarter, to a dizzying NOK 1.94 trillion, or about USD 327.5 billion.
That's up from NOK 1.88 trillion in the first quarter of this year. And while stockmarkets have fallen worldwide in recent weeks, the top manager of the oil fund just sees opportunities.
"We have a long-term horizon, and don't need to sell anything," said Knut N Kjær, director of Norges Bank's Investment Management. "To the contrary, we can buy shares that others have to sell. We will continue to buy shares over the next several years."
The fund is one of the world's largest investment funds and has placed Norway, an otherwise small country with a population of just 4.6 million, firmly on the world economic map.
Its reserves now mean that each Norwegian resident has nearly NOK 400,000 saved up in the fund, which aims to meet future social security obligations. Norwegians continue to be taxed heavily as well, meanwhile, and calls are constantly being made for politicians to dip into the fund more often to finance current social services. They generally resist the temptation, even when schools are overcrowded, hospitals have waiting lists and police need more resources.
The numbers released Tuesday came from Norway's central bank (Norges Bank), and indicate that the fund is approaching the size of Norway's Gross Domestic Product, which grew to the equivalent of about USD 353 billion in 2006.
The bank already has reported that the fund's growth continued in July, and that it may reach about NOK 2.1 trillion by the end of the year.
