EPFO aims at 8.5 pc interest for FY10

The Employees Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) aims to pay 8.5 per cent interest to its 40 million-plus subscribers for 2009/10,as new fund managers have helped it earn better returns,a top labour ministry official said on Thursday.

We will be able to give 8.5 per cent without dipping into our reserves, labour secretary Sudha Pillai said,adding that the fund earned a minimum interest of 8.68 per cent between September and March.

Pillai ruled out the possibility of investing a portion of the Rs 2,90,000-crore corpus of the pension fund in equity market in the near future. Equity market,see,they (EPFO) will not go for it because of large size of corpus and high risks, she said.