Pension Pulse

Ben Martin of the Telegraph reports, Canadian pension funds and Kuwait to buy London City Airport : Three Canadian pension funds and the Kuwait Investment Authority have won the takeover battle for London City Airport with an offer of about £2bn. A consortium made up of Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (OTPP), Borealis, AIMCo and Wren House, an infrastructure investment vehicle owned by the sovereign wealth fund of Kuwait, are understood to have struck a deal to buy the airport from Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP), the giant private equity firm. The group saw off stiff competition for the site, including bids from Chinese airlines owner HNA and Cheung Kong Infrastructure Holdings , the firm controlled by Li Ka-Shing, Asia’s richest man.  Suitors have been circling the airport since last August, when GIP revealed that it was selling the site. The auction, which was run by Credit Suisse, drew a host of bidders from the infrastructure investment world, attracted to the rare

The Montreal Gazette reports, Caisse de dépôt posts 9.1% return in 2015 : A weak Canadian dollar ended up being a strong contributor to the Caisse de Dépôt et Placement du Québec’s impressive 2015 results. With more than a quarter of its assets now in U.S. investments, the provincial pension-fund manager rode a 20-per-cent rise in the U.S. dollar to an annual return of 9.1 per cent last year, extending its solid run under Michael Sabia, chief executive since 2009. The Caisse beat its benchmark index by a full 2.4 per cent, one of its largest margins of outperformance in the last 20 years . The average Canadian pension fund made about 5.4 per cent last year, according to a recent report from RBC Investor & Treasury Services. “It’s again an outstanding performance for Sabia. They are very conservative, very focused,” said former Caisse executive Michel Nadeau, now director-general of the Institute for Governance of Private and Public Organizations. Nadeau said a number

Susan Smith wrote a special for the Globe and Mail, Canada’s pension safety net is strong but showing strains : Amid all the worry about the boomer bubble, longer lifespans and uncertain economic conditions, it’s comforting to know that Canada’s retirement savings system ranks highly among its peers around the world. Last year Canada managed to hang on to seventh place among 25 countries in a key annual ranking of retirement systems. The 2015 Melbourne Mercer Global Pension Index places Canada behind Denmark, the Netherlands, Australia, Sweden, Switzerland and Finland in a ranking that considers more than 40 indicators measuring the adequacy, sustainability and integrity of pension systems covering almost 60 per cent of the world’s population. Canada’s index value was 70 – up from 69.1 – which gave it a grade of B, the same mark it received the previous year. Denmark, with a ranking of 81.7, and the Netherlands, at 80.5, were the only two countries to receive an A. Since th

Yolanda Bobeldijk of Dow Jones Financial News reports, Ontario Teachers to offload $1bn private equity portfolio : Toronto-based Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan is preparing to sell a large private equity portfolio into the market for second-hand fund stakes, according to people familiar with the matter. The portfolio is worth around $1 billion and consists of fund stakes in a range of private equity funds spread globally , the people said. The $155 billion Canadian pension plan is speaking to a limited group of potential buyers. The process is at an early stage and no formal bids have been made yet. A spokesman for Ontario Teachers’ declined to comment on the deal, but said in an emailed statement: "We regularly review our allocation of funds. We remain committed to investing in Europe via GP [general partner] allocation, co-investments and directly." As the private equity market continues to mature, many institutions have become active buyers and sellers in