Late 2018 was a challenging quarter for global investments. Slowing markets in China and Japan, the ongoing uncertainty around Brexit, and tightening monetary policy all aligned to deliver negative sharemarket returns. 

Equip MySuper, the default investment option, returned -2.1% for the six months to 31 December 2018, as did Equip Balanced Growth. That being said, Equip performed better than similarly invested options by most other super funds, minimising any losses. 

It's important to keep the last quarter in perspective, and consider investment returns over the long term. The chart below shows the financial year returns for the Balanced Growth accumulation option over the lat 20 years. 

You’ll see that there have been a couple of down years during the two decades, specifically during the Global Financial Crisis, when share markets were down by double digits, dragging balanced portfolios into the negative. Despite all of this, long-term performance has been strong – over the last 10 years, the option returned 8.3% annually; over the last 20 financial years it's been 7.5% p.a

View the full investment report and check your returns. Click here.