Universal pension declares investment profit, subscribers to get up to 11.72 percent

The National Pension Authority has decided to distribute the investment profit for the 2025-26 fiscal year to subscribers of the universal pension schemes. Profit earned on investments ranged from a minimum of 11.68 percent to a maximum of 11.72 percent, the authority said in a press release on Monday.

According to the release, the pension schemes' investments earned a total profit of Tk 289,655,048.80 in the 2025-26 fiscal year. The proposal to distribute this profit among subscribers was approved at the fourth meeting of the authority's board of directors.

Under the law and rules, the profit earned has been added to each subscriber's own pension account, known as the corpus account, based on the amount and duration of each subscriber's deposits. In other words, not everyone receives the same amount at the same effective return — the larger and longer-held a deposit, the larger the profit credited in proportion.

Dr Md Suratuzzaman, executive chairman of the National Pension Authority, said the authority is working transparently to increase public trust in the universal pension system and to ensure the security of subscribers' deposits alongside a reasonable profit. The distribution will directly benefit subscribers and make the programme more dynamic, he added.

The release also said the earned profit has already been credited to the accounts of the subscribers concerned. Subscribers will therefore see the increased amount in their accounts without needing to file a separate application or claim.

One of the main public questions about the universal pension system has been how safe deposited money would be and whether it would earn any profit at all. This announcement of a distribution at a rate above 11.5 percent offers a practical answer to that question — at least on the first full fiscal year's accounts, the authority has been able to show earnings from its investments.

The range of rates — from 11.68 to 11.72 percent — points to small differences between schemes. Because different schemes have different investment structures, the profit rates they earned also differ slightly. In every scheme, however, the rate stayed above 11.5 percent, which is reassuring news for subscribers.

Although the total profit exceeds Tk 28 crore, it has been distributed in proportion to all subscribers' deposits. How much was credited to any individual's account therefore depends on that person's own deposit history. The authority has not published a subscriber-by-subscriber list; each person can learn their own profit figure by checking their own account.

According to the authority, transparency is the main foundation of trust in this system. The release emphasised that every step — approval at the board meeting, distribution under the law and rules, and direct crediting to accounts — was carried out following formal process.

What remains to be seen is how much new subscriber interest this profit distribution generates, and whether the authority can sustain the same profit in the fiscal years ahead. A good first distribution experience would give this long-term savings system a chance to build stronger public trust.