In the current low-yield environment, many pension funds are looking for alternatives to fixed income to earn the returns required to pay pension obligations. The answer for some may be private credit. “We like private credit because we see a lot of excess yield compared to the same risk and return that you can achieve […]
The Saskatchewan Pension Plan is improving investment choice for members in the accumulation phase and introducing new options to help them through decumulation as well. Leading up to retirement, SPP members are defaulted into a balanced fund, which has been in place since the plan started in 1986. In 2010, it introduced a short-term fund, […]
Statistics Canada says the economy saw its largest monthly drop on record in April as it came to a near standstill due to the pandemic, but early indications point to a rebound in May as businesses began to reopen. The agency said Tuesday gross domestic product fell 11.6 per cent in April with non-essential businesses […]
Since 2004, Canada has held a AAA rating from all major ratings agencies, but on June 24, it suffered a blow when Fitch Ratings Inc. downgraded the country to AA+. “The rating downgrade reflects the deterioration of Canada’s public finances in 2020 resulting from the coronavirus pandemic,” said the Fitch in a rating action commentary […]
As the novel coronavirus pandemic upended the way businesses operate, investors around the world have been able follow daily market gyrations in real time to see how public companies are being impacted and what the crisis is doing to valuations. What has been perhaps less visible is how private equity firms have responded to the […]
Along with the rest of the globe, Canada isn’t likely to see the V-shaped recovery that institutional investors were hoping for as it stares down the recessionary road ahead. “Canadian activity was also on the softening path even at the end of last year,” says Irene Lauro, an economist at Schroders. “And this is because […]
The International Monetary Fund has sharply lowered its forecast for global growth this year because it envisions far more severe economic damage from the coronavirus than it did just two months ago. The IMF predicts that the global economy will shrink 4.9 per cent this year, significantly worse than the three per cent drop it […]
Meeting a deadline in the midst of a pandemic seems like a good test of corporate resiliency and, according to a recent survey of Canadian Principles for Responsible Investment signatories that I conducted on behalf of my consulting firm Real Alts, the majority of respondents likely passed. The survey found that almost 80 per cent […]
The coronavirus pandemic will leave some long-term economic damage that will only become clearer as the country moves further along a “prolonged and bumpy” course to recovery, Canada’s top central banker says. In his first speech as governor, Tiff Macklem said the central bank expects to see growth in the third quarter of this year […]
In the early days of litigation finance, most fund managers sold a concept and their own capabilities, but not much else. And risky strategies attracted risky investors. For instance, litigation finance attracted high net-worth individual and family office capital from those who are very comfortable assuming risks. It also attracted sophisticated hedge funds who get […]