In 2022, normal was supposed to make a comeback — it didn’t. Just as supply chains began to stabilize, war broke out in Europe, China invaded Taiwan’s waters, inflation skyrocketed and central banks began hiking interest rates. While investments in renewable energy infrastructure reached new highs, economies that had been moving away from fossil fuels […]
The Ontario Municipal Employees’ Retirement System is appointing Prabha Ram as managing director of global equities at its investment arm, OMERS Capital Markets. In the new role, Ram will oversee the management of the defined benefit pension plan’s core public equity portfolio and contribute to the development of its existing investment framework. She will report […]
While global institutional investors expect losses to continue in the fixed income market and are concerned that central banks may be too optimistic on the peak of inflation, they’re also finding good news in alternative investments and the importance of environmental, social and governance factors, according to a new report by Aeon Investments. The report, […]
Six months into a war that has killed thousands of Ukrainians and displaced more than 12 million more, most of the pledges by U.S. pension funds, university endowments and other public sector holdings to drop Russian investments have gone unfulfilled, according to an Associated Press review, state retirement administrators and firms that invest state funds. […]
An article on the Royal Bank of Canada’s plans for returning employees to the office was the most-read story on BenefitsCanada.com over the last week. Here are the five most popular news stories of the week: 1. RBC employees returning to in-office working to foster creativity, collaboration 2. CPPIB backing of grain exporter provides Russia propaganda victory: expert […]
The Public Sector Pension Investment Board says it dumped a significant portion of its shares in two giant technology companies during the first half of 2021. In a report to the U.S. Securities Exchange Commission, the investment organization showed the total number of shares it held in Apple Inc. decreased by 680,541 during the first […]
The University Pension Plan is rolling out a new climate strategy that aims to make its portfolio carbon neutral by 2040. “I’m proud that we’ve set an ambition consistent with the challenge we face,” says Brian Minns (pictured), managing director of responsible investing at the UPP. “We’re going to deliver on our investment returns in […]
Canada’s defined benefit pension plan sponsors are more concerned about broad-scale climate resilience in portfolios than they were before the coronavirus pandemic, according to a new report by the Global Risk Institute and the Smart Prosperity Institute. “It’s increasingly clear that climate change’s impact is accelerating and that’s fuelling a movement toward sustainable finance,” says […]
A new report is urging pension plan sponsors and other institutional investors to ensure the resilience of their portfolios in a number of different inflationary scenarios. The report from Mercer argued inflation rises spurred by the coronavirus pandemic and widespread monetary easing are balanced by several disinflationary forces, like globalization. Geopolitical tensions, however, could upset […]
There are a lot of reasons to believe financial markets will be very different in the next 10 to 20 years than what pension funds have been used to, according to Aaron Bennett, chief investment officer of the University Pension Plan, during a session at the Canadian Pension and Benefits Institute forum in Montreal last […]