Tancoo: Individuals must build their own retirement security

Finance Minister Dave Tancoo holds up a copy of the budget statement while delivering his address at the T&T Manufacturers' Association post-budget forum at the Hyatt Regency, Port-of-Spain, on October 14.

On Oc­to­ber 24, Min­is­ter of Fi­nance Dav­en­dranath Tan­coo made an speech as he de­liv­ered the fea­ture ad­dress at the Trinidad and To­ba­go Stock Ex­change's Cap­i­tal Mar­kets Con­fer­ence 2025, which was themed Fu­ture Proof­ing Cap­i­tal Mar­kets in an Era of Trans­for­ma­tion.

In the speech, Mr Tan­coo tied in what the Gov­ern­ment is do­ing to en­sure the sus­tain­abil­i­ty of the Na­tion­al In­sur­ance Sys­tem with the two new in­vest­ment prod­ucts that are in­tend­ed to be launched in the cur­rent fi­nan­cial year.

The Na­tion­al In­sur­ance Sys­tem is al­ready un­der se­ri­ous strain. At this very mo­ment, we are pay­ing out more in ben­e­fits than we are col­lect­ing in con­tri­bu­tions. The fund is be­ing drawn down each year to cov­er that gap.

When we as­sumed of­fice in May 2025, the ac­tu­ar­i­al es­ti­mates re­vealed some­thing deeply con­cern­ing -- that if no ac­tion were tak­en, the Na­tion­al In­sur­ance Fund would be com­plete­ly de­plet­ed by the year 2033 or 2034.

Let me re­peat that: with­in eight years, the fund that sup­ports tens of thou­sands of our re­tirees could be emp­ty.

That is un­ac­cept­able. This Gov­ern­ment will not, un­der any cir­cum­stances, al­low that to hap­pen. We will not sit by and watch our se­nior cit­i­zens suf­fer be­cause of in­ac­tion or po­lit­i­cal con­ve­nience. Some­one had to make the hard de­ci­sions to pro­tect the vul­ner­a­ble -- and we did.

That is why we are im­ple­ment­ing a three per cent in­crease in con­tri­bu­tion rates in Jan­u­ary 2026, fol­lowed by an­oth­er three per­cent in Jan­u­ary 2027, and a grad­ual in­crease in the re­tire­ment age be­gin­ning in 2028. These are not easy choic­es. No one en­joys rais­ing con­tri­bu­tion rates.

But the al­ter­na­tive is far worse -- an en­tire gen­er­a­tion of re­tirees left with­out se­cu­ri­ty, with­out dig­ni­ty, and with­out the ben­e­fits they earned through decades of hard work.

Giv­en our fis­cal cir­cum­stances, it must be clear that the Gov­ern­ment can­not sim­ply sub­sidise the sys­tem. That ap­proach is nei­ther sus­tain­able nor re­spon­si­ble. Our rev­enue base is evolv­ing, and in some ar­eas shrink­ing, par­tic­u­lar­ly as our work­ing pop­u­la­tion de­clines.

We must there­fore con­front these is­sues hon­est­ly, plan care­ful­ly, and act de­ci­sive­ly. What we need is not more de­pen­dence.

What we need is more par­tic­i­pa­tion -- more peo­ple in­vest­ing, sav­ing, and build­ing wealth for their own fu­ture.

This, my friends and val­ued stake­hold­ers, is where you come in. This is where the cap­i­tal mar­ket be­comes ab­solute­ly es­sen­tial.

Be­cause the an­swer to our na­tion­al chal­lenge can­not be more gov­ern­ment spend­ing. The re­al so­lu­tion is more cit­i­zen in­vest­ment. More wealth cre­ation. More par­tic­i­pa­tion in the econ­o­my.

A strong and dy­nam­ic cap­i­tal mar­ket is at the heart of the trans­for­ma­tion that we en­vi­sion for Trinidad and To­ba­go. It is one of the most pow­er­ful mech­a­nisms we have for mo­bil­is­ing sav­ings, di­rect­ing in­vest­ment and gen­er­at­ing wealth.

A mod­ern, deep and liq­uid stock mar­ket pro­vides the foun­da­tion for busi­ness ex­pan­sion, in­no­va­tion and long-term eco­nom­ic growth. It gives cit­i­zens a di­rect stake in na­tion­al progress. It al­lows in­di­vid­u­als to save, to in­vest, and to build their own per­son­al wealth and re­tire­ment se­cu­ri­ty, in­de­pen­dent of gov­ern­ment. It chan­nels do­mes­tic sav­ings in­to pro­duc­tive ven­tures that cre­ate jobs and stim­u­late growth. It en­ables busi­ness­es to ac­cess long-term fi­nanc­ing with­out be­ing over­ly de­pen­dent on banks or state en­ter­pris­es. And most im­por­tant­ly, it al­lows or­di­nary cit­i­zens to share di­rect­ly in the wealth of their na­tion.

This is not the­o­ry. This is proven fact.

Around the world, coun­tries that de­vel­oped strong cap­i­tal mar­kets ear­ly have cre­at­ed wealth for their cit­i­zens and built buffers against ag­ing pop­u­la­tions and fis­cal pres­sure.

Their cit­i­zens have pen­sions, mu­tu­al funds, in­vest­ment port­fo­lios and eq­ui­ty hold­ings that pro­vide sta­bil­i­ty and in­de­pen­dence.

We al­ready have some of these el­e­ments here in Trinidad and To­ba­go, but they must be strength­ened and ex­pand­ed.

Let me be ab­solute­ly clear, the cap­i­tal mar­ket is not just for the wealthy or the elite. I am sure you will agree. It is for every­one -- for peo­ple from every walk of life, in every com­mu­ni­ty, re­gard­less of in­come. It does not mat­ter if one starts with a large in­vest­ment or a small one. What mat­ters is the de­ci­sion to start, and the com­mit­ment to stay the course for the long term.

Na­tions that fail to fol­low this path face un­sus­tain­able fis­cal bur­dens. So there­fore, Trinidad and To­ba­go has a choice to make.

We can con­tin­ue down a path of de­pen­dence -- re­ly­ing al­most en­tire­ly on gov­ern­ment to pro­vide, to spend, and to sub­sidise -- a path that leads ul­ti­mate­ly to col­lapse. Or we can build a mod­ern, di­ver­si­fied, and re­silient econ­o­my where the cap­i­tal mar­ket plays a cen­tral and en­dur­ing role.

This Gov­ern­ment has cho­sen the sec­ond path. And we are not mere­ly talk­ing about it. We are act­ing on it.

The 2026 na­tion­al bud­get sets out a com­pre­hen­sive strat­e­gy to strength­en the cap­i­tal mar­ket and ex­pand cit­i­zen par­tic­i­pa­tion.

This is just the be­gin­ning.

Through col­lab­o­ra­tion with our part­ners and stake­hold­ers, we in­tend to go even fur­ther in the months and years ahead.

Al­low me to out­line a few of the key ini­tia­tives that are al­ready un­der­way:

* ↓The state-spon­sored Re­al Es­tate In­vest­ment Trust (RE­IT)

For the first time in our na­tion's his­to­ry, the Gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go is cre­at­ing a state-spon­sored Re­al Es­tate In­vest­ment Trust -- a RE­IT -- backed by gov­ern­ment-owned prop­er­ties. Com­mer­cial build­ings, of­fice spaces, and oth­er in­come gen­er­at­ing as­sets will be placed in­to a pro­fes­sion­al­ly man­aged trust.

Shares in this trust will be list­ed on the Trinidad and To­ba­go Stock Ex­change, giv­ing every cit­i­zen, pen­sion funds, and in­sti­tu­tions the op­por­tu­ni­ty to own a stake in these valu­able as­sets and to earn div­i­dends from them.

This ini­tia­tive achieves two crit­i­cal goals.

First, it un­locks val­ue from prop­er­ties that cur­rent­ly sit on the Gov­ern­ment's bal­ance sheet with lim­it­ed fi­nan­cial re­turn.

Sec­ond, and per­haps most im­por­tant­ly, it de­moc­ra­tis­es own­er­ship. In­stead of the State hold­ing every­thing, cit­i­zens will di­rect­ly hold a piece. Wealth will be dis­trib­uted. Par­tic­i­pa­tion will ex­pand. The cap­i­tal mar­ket will deep­en.

* ↓The Na­tion­al In­vest­ment Fund Bond

In fis­cal year 2026, we will al­so launch a one-bil­lion-dol­lar Na­tion­al In­vest­ment Fund Bond, backed by shares in First Cit­i­zens Group Fi­nan­cial Hold­ings. This bond will of­fer cit­i­zens and in­sti­tu­tions a safe, tax-free in­vest­ment op­por­tu­ni­ty.

It will al­low in­di­vid­u­als to in­vest in a ve­hi­cle linked to the per­for­mance of a strong na­tion­al in­sti­tu­tion. Crit­i­cal­ly, it will al­so al­low the Gov­ern­ment to raise fi­nanc­ing with­out in­creas­ing the pub­lic debt or ad­verse­ly af­fect­ing the debt-to-GDP ra­tio.

These are re­spon­si­ble poli­cies that place cit­i­zens at the cen­tre of na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment.

* ↓Sup­port for SMEs on the Stock Ex­change

Ad­di­tion­al­ly, we will be re­view­ing and en­hanc­ing the tax in­cen­tives for small and medi­um en­ter­pris­es that choose to list on the Trinidad and To­ba­go Stock Ex­change.

Our goal is to en­cour­age greater par­tic­i­pa­tion on the Ex­change and to sup­port the growth of lo­cal busi­ness­es. Why does this mat­ter? Be­cause true di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion de­pends on build­ing in­dus­tries be­yond the en­er­gy sec­tor -- in man­u­fac­tur­ing, agri­cul­ture, tourism, tech­nol­o­gy, and fi­nan­cial ser­vices.

These sec­tors need cap­i­tal to grow, and the SME Mar­ket on the Stock Ex­change pro­vides a bridge to that cap­i­tal.

When an SME lists on the Ex­change, it gains not on­ly fund­ing but al­so struc­ture. It adopts bet­ter gov­er­nance, stronger trans­paren­cy, and a high­er lev­el of pub­lic trust. It be­comes a com­pa­ny that cit­i­zens can be­lieve in and in­vest.

That is how we build an own­er­ship cul­ture in Trinidad and To­ba­go -- and that is how we build wealth from the ground up.

We will al­so be launch­ing the Na­tion­al In­no­va­tion and In­cu­ba­tor Pro­gramme, de­signed to strength­en the ecosys­tem for in­no­va­tion and en­tre­pre­neur­ship.

Through this ini­tia­tive, top-tier busi­ness­es and start-ups will be sup­port­ed as they trans­form their ideas in­to vi­able, scal­able ven­tures, ul­ti­mate­ly list­ing on the SME Mar­ket and con­tribut­ing to our broad­er di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion agen­da.

* ↓Dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion of the cap­i­tal mar­ket

We will al­so be work­ing close­ly with the Trinidad and To­ba­go Stock Ex­change to mod­ernise the in­fra­struc­ture of the cap­i­tal mar­ket it­self.

Ac­tive dis­cus­sions are on­go­ing to digi­tise the is­suance of Gov­ern­ment bonds.

While com­pet­ing de­mands have slowed the process, we recog­nise the enor­mous val­ue of this re­form, and we re­main ful­ly com­mit­ted to ad­vanc­ing it. Our ap­proach aligns with the Na­tion­al Dig­i­tal Pay­ment Strat­e­gy and with the Cen­tral Bank's mod­erni­sa­tion of pay­ment sys­tems.

The goal is sim­ple: to make in­vest­ing as seam­less as send­ing a mes­sage. To re­move fric­tion. To ex­pand ac­cess. And to bring more peo­ple in­to the mar­ket.