ICICI Pru provided the best yield on investments made on behalf of the retirement fund body Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) during the two-and-a-half-year period ended March 31, 2011, while Reliance Capital gave the lowest rate of returns.

The investments made by ICICI Pru yielded returns of 8.72 per cent followed by HSBC AMC (8.64 per cent) and SBI (8.61 per cent).

The lowest return of 8.57 per cent was provided by Reliance Capital, though it was slightly higher than the EPFO's benchmark yield of 8.52 per cent.

The analysis was conducted by CRISIL, which was engaged by the EPFO for the purpose.

EPFO had engaged the four asset management firms from September 17 in 2008 to March 31, 2011, with a view to improve the yield on its investments so that it could provide better returns on PF deposits to its over 4.72 crore subscribers.

Before the appointment of these four asset management companies (AMCs), SBI was the sole fund manager for the EPFO since the retirement fund body's inception in 1952.

These four fund managers are among the 11 AMCs which are in the race to bag the contract to manage EPFO funds for another three-year term beginning July 1.

interim manager

After the end of the term of the existing four fund managers on March 31, EPFO had decided to engage SBI to manage its funds for three months as an interim arrangement till June 30.

The decision was taken by the EPFO's apex decision making body, Central Board of Trustees, in March because the retirement fund body could not appoint the new fund managers well in time so that they could take over by April 1 this year.

Besides the existing fund managers, seven new firms including Kotak Securities, Securities Trading Corporation of India, UTI Securities and ICICI Securities had shown interest in managing EPFO funds.

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