When Norges Bank Investment Management was set up in January 1998, we were given a mandate to start investing in equities. The first job was to get the fund invested in the equity markets, and this was executed efficiently through four external index managers. At the time, the investment strategy was still undecided, but by the end of
the year, the decision had been taken to fund active managers as well. This was controversial and led to numerous discussions both within the central bank and with the Ministry of Finance officials. The first mandates awarded at the end of November 1998 needed
to put in a good performance quite early if the strategy was to be continued. This review of the first 20 years of external active mandates sums up our experience – and yes, things started well.