While the Bank of Canada had long talked down the idea of raising interest rates any time soon, the sentiment changed last month when it announced the economy was now strong enough to handle an increase. The move followed the U.S. Federal Reserve’s decision to raise its key interest rate for the third time in […]
La Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec has posted a return of five per cent for the first half of 2017 and a five-year annualized return of 10.6 per cent. The return, which is for the six months ended June 30, 2017, represents an improvement from the same period last year when the Caisse […]
The Canada Pension Plan fund’s net assets increased to $326.5 billion at the end of the first quarter of fiscal 2018, compared to $316.7 billion at the end of fiscal 2017. The $9.8-billion rise in assets for the quarter ended June 30, 2017, consisted of $5.7 billion in net income after all Canada Pension Plan […]
Target-date funds seek to provide members of defined contribution pension plans with a straightforward experience, adjusting their asset mix in a set-it-and-forget-it option geared towards achieving acceptable retirement outcomes. But the target-date fund world is diverse. There are differing features, including active and passive underlying funds, glide paths that go to or through a retirement date, […]
Diversified pooled pension fund managers posted a median return of 0.7 per cent before management fees for the second quarter of 2017 and a median year-to-date return of 3.6 per cent, according to a new report by Morneau Shepell Ltd. The quarterly report, which covers about 324 pooled funds that have a market value of […]
While investors seeking reasonable returns in a low interest rate environment will find them in U.S. treasury and corporate bonds, they should still remain cautious about inflated optimism for the economy and tight credit spreads in the fixed-income market, according to an investment expert. “Investors around the world are searching for yield. You see it […]
How would an interest rate boost affect pension plans?
Investors will be watching closely as speculation ramps up that Canada’s central bank will raise interest rates by 25 basis points on Wednesday. A modest increase won’t lead to a significant impact on the market in the short term because it has already reacted to the expectations of rising rates in the past few weeks, […]
Three to four years ago, institutional investors were showing strong interest in frontier markets as they sought opportunities for lower correlations with global markets. But then commodities took a downturn and investors quickly lost interest, says Kurt Reiman, chief investment strategist at BlackRock Asset Management Canada Ltd. “All it took was a couple of years […]
The Alberta Investment Management Corp. is investing in Calgary-based oil and gas company Ikkuma Resources Corp. through a $45-million financing deal. According to the agreement, AIMCo will provide a second lien loan at an annual interest rate of 7.25 per cent. In turn, AIMCo can purchase up to 6,750,000 common shares of the company for 86 cents each […]