Dear fund members,

Details of the 2023 annual financial statement of our pension fund and a short outlook for 2024 are set out below:

2023 Annual Financial Statement and Sustainability Issues

The Board of Trustees approved the 2023 annual financial statement of our pension fund at its meeting on May 16, 2024. Our pension fund achieved an investment performance of 4.50% in the 2023 fiscal year. All investment categories delivered positive results. Particular mention must be made of the global stock markets, which performed strongly in the last fiscal year.

Our pension fund finished the 2023 fiscal year with a coverage ratio of 113.30% 
(2022: 110.20%). By way of comparison, according to the OPSC report 2024¹, the average coverage ratio for private pension funds in 2023 was 110.3%.

The key performance indicators for 2023 are listed below:



• Total assets: CHF 746.89 million (2022: CHF 671.16 million)
• Fluctuation reserve: CHF 85.80 million (2022: CHF 60.71 million)
• Number of active fund members: 1,451 (2022: 1,443)
• Number of pension recipients: 209 (2022: 204)

The administrative expenses per fund member (excluding asset management) amounted to CHF 268. Comparison with the Swisscanto study 2024: CHF 350² per fund member from pension funds of private sector employers.

The asset management expenses amounted to 0.26% of the assets, which is considerably below the average of 0.41%³ (median of all pension funds). The amount of the asset management expenses is largely dependent on the defined investment strategy.

The Board of Trustees also considers sustainability issues when investing assets. These include both the issues of involvement/exercising voting rights as well as climate risks/decarbonization/measuring the carbon footprint.

As Bayer Pension Fund Switzerland does not have any directly held shares in its portfolio, the involvement and exercising of voting rights is carried out via the asset manager Zürcher Kantonalbank. Our asset manager practices active “involvement”. It exercises its voting rights, and does so based on the sustainable voting rights guidelines that it has defined. 

Just under 40% of the investments have been made with sustainable index funds from the “Swisscanto Responsible Index Funds”. The responsible investments have carbon emissions that are around 20% lower than the standard benchmark.

The performance YTD 5/13/2024 is 5.0%, which reflects an increase in the coverage ratio to over 115%.

Outlook for 2024



The referendum on the reform of the occupational pension plan (BVG reform) will take place on 
September 20, 2024. The BVG reform includes the following three measures in the area of mandatory occupational pensions:

• Reduction of statutory conversion rate from 6.8% to 6.0%
• Building-up the saving process
• Pension supplement for the transition generation

More information can be found here: https://www.bsv.admin.ch/bsv/de/home/sozialversicherungen/bv/reformen-und-revisionen.html

Bayer Pension Fund Switzerland has level of provision that is considerably above the statutory minimum. The envisaged reduction in the conversion rate will therefore only have a limited effect on Bayer Pension Fund Switzerland.

Detailed information will be published in the voter pamphlet as and when appropriate.

If you have any questions, our contacts at Kessler Vorsorge AG and the members of the Board of Trustees will be happy to help.

Yours sincerely,

Bayer Pension Fund Switzerland

¹ Report of the Occupational Pension Supervisory Commission OPSC: https://www.oak-bv.admin.ch/de/oak-startseite
² Information as per Swisscanto study 2024 concerning the 2023 annual financial statements.
³ Information as per Swisscanto study 2024 concerning the 2023 annual financial statements.