While the term “Sovereign Wealth Fund” was coined only recently, SWFs have a more than 50-year history, with the first fund established by Kuwait in 1953. 12 There is no universally agreed upon definition of SWFs. The . Treasury Department narrowly defines SWFs as “a government investment vehicle which is funded by foreign exchange assets, and which manages those assets separately from the official reserves of the monetary authorities (the Central Bank and reserve-related functions of the Finance Ministry).”13 The . Treasury Department’s definition is meant primarily to distinguish SWF investment from official reserves managed by a country’s central bank. Because the primary goals of official.
