* Pension fund to boosts stock holdings in 2010
* To spend bulk of H2 alternative investment on property
* Sovereign wealth fund to hold on to Merrill stake (Adds NPS, KIC quotes, background)
By Yeon-hee Kim and Marie-France Han
SEOUL, June 30 (Reuters) - South Korea said on Tuesday the state-run pension fund, which manages $200 billion, is set to boost the portion of its holdings in stocks and property in 2010 while reducing bonds in its overall investment mix.
By shifting funds to stocks and away from bonds, the National Pension Service is adopting a slightly riskier profile, which one fund manager said reflected a need to boost returns to support pension payouts to an ageing population.
"NPS cannot help but increase its stocks holdings and risky assets in order to secure better returns, while it prepares for its working population between the ages of 20 and 60 to retire in coming years," the fund manager, who declined to be identified, said.
South Korea has one of the fastest-growing greying populations in the world. The National Statistical Office said in a report in 2006 that those aged 65 or older would jump from 9 percent of the population in 2005 to about 14 percent 2018.
The service, the world's fourth-biggest pension fund, will raise domestic and overseas stocks to 21.7 percent of total investment in 2010 from 18.8 percent this year.
It will cut bond holdings to 71.9 percent from 76.2 percent, the health and welfare ministry, responsible for the fund, said in a statement.
The fund has earmarked most of a $2 billion alternative investment budget for the second half of 2009 for property, an official told Reuters.
"The targets will be landmark-type buildings in major cities. We see good opportunities in the real estate market," Kim Hee-seok, head of NPS' global investment team, said on the sidelines of an investor forum.
NPS has already spent $500 million this year on alternative investments.
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The pension fund posted a 0.18 percent loss on its 2008 investments. It will have a net 28 trillion won ($22 billion) available for additional investment next year and will allocate 6.9 trillion won of the total to domestic stocks, 4.9 trillion won to overseas stocks, 9.2 trillion won to domestic bonds, 1.3 trillion won to foreign bonds and 5.7 trillion won to alternative investment.
The pension service had an outstanding 235.4 trillion won in funds at the end of 2008 and the total is now estimated to have risen to about 250 trillion won, a ministry official said.
Also on Tuesday, the head of alternative investments at
Korea Investment Corp. (KIC), South Korea's sovereign wealth
fund, said the fund would hold on to its 0.96 percent stake in
Bank of America-Merrill Lynch
KIC, which has shied away from foreign assets since its much-criticised $2 billion investment in Merrill Lynch early last year, said it would spend $1 billion of its overseas alternative investment budget in private equity secondary markets, hedge funds and commodities within this year. [ID:nSEO146236]
(Additional reporting by Yoo Choonsik; editing by Neil Fullick) ($1=1277.7 Won)