Experts and the media said the writing was on the wall. Just over three years later, the nightmare became a reality.
The Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry announced last month that the Government Pension Investment Fund suffered an investment loss of 2.15 trillion yen between last April and September, bringing accumulated losses to more than 5 trillion yen.
Many had questioned if welfare ministry officials were qualified to manage such a huge fund when the ruling parties rammed through a law to transfer the management of all public pension funds -- now snowballing to 150 trillion yen -- from the Finance Ministry to the Government Pension Investment Fund.