Derry workers' pensions invested in vaccine producer BioNTech

The pensions of Education Authority, NIHE, Magee, City of Derry Airport, NWRC and Ulsterbus and other public service workers managed by the Northern Ireland Local Government Officers’ Superannuation Committee (NILGOSC) have also been invested in several companies that have seen their valuations rocket during the course of the COVID-19 pandemic.

They include Netflix, Peloton, Zoom, Disney, Amazon, Alphabet, Facebook and Tesla among others.

According to the latest NILGOSC Equity Holdings, at March 31, 2021, the public workers' pension fund had 160,637 shares valued at £12,711,710 in BioNTech SE - the Mainz-headquartered biotech firm which developed the Pfizer vaccine which is currently being injected into arms in Derry and across the globe.

Meanwhile, a whopping £38,599,510 worth of local pensions have been used to buy 102,089 shares in the popular entertainment company Netflix Inc Com Stk which has helped distract hundreds of millions of people from the misery of COVID-19 over the last two years.

A grand total of £29,574,865 has been put into 362,932 shares in Peloton Interactive Inc - the US firm that sells internet-connected exercise bicycles that allow users to participate in races and runs remotely.

Other significant shareholdings in companies that thrived over the pandemic include Alphabet Inc (20,915 shares worth £31,331,623), Amazon (29,173 shares worth £65,422,832), Walt Disney (49,391 shares worth £6,606,229), Zoom Video Communications Inc (93,983 shares worth £21,885,769), Tesla Inc (113,555 £54,979,151) and Facebook Inc (127,781 shares worth £27,277,912).

The full lost of holdings is available to view here.