But that is unlikely to continue, Mr Tangen told Reuters. Now we have record low interest rates and record-high stock markets. With record-low interest rates, they are unlikely to go down further, Tangen said, adding that the relationship between risk and return was now different, for both bonds and stocks. So we are extremely unlikely to have any kind of repeat of the last 25 years, he added.
When it first became a sovereign wealth fund it only invested in government bonds, with corporate bonds, stocks and real estate added later. Last year, the fund was allowed to take direct stakes in renewable projects.
Volkswagen, whose shares rose as much as 3.8 per cent, did not specifically say how much the plan will cost. It said in December that it planned to spend €35 billion ($41.7bn) on e-mobility as a whole by 2025.
The group had been a laggard on electrification until it admitted in 2015 to cheating on US diesel emissions tests and had to deal with new Chinese quotas for electric vehicles. It now has one of the most ambitious programmes in the industry.
Volkswagen said the European factories will have a joint production capacity of up to 240 gigawatt hours (GWh) a year, adding the first 40 GWh would come from Sweden s Northvolt, with production starting in 2023.