Pension Pulse

James Bradshaw of the Globe and Mail reports  AIMCo adds former CIO to board of directors: Alberta Investment Management Corp. has added former chief investment officer Sandra Lau to its board of directors, as the government-owned pension fund manager rebuilds its leadership team after a mass purge late last year. Ms. Lau was AIMCo’s CIO for less than a year, starting in 2022. She retired in 2023 after 24 years at the Crown corporation, including a stint leading AIMCo’s fixed-income investments. She was succeeded by Marlene Puffer, who left the institution last September. AIMCo has been without a full-time CIO since then. Ms. Lau is the sixth member of a revamped AIMCo board led by chair Stephen Harper, the former prime minister. “Sandra Lau brings both exceptional skills and a unique perspective, and I am pleased to welcome her back to AIMCo as a member of the board,” Mr. Harper said in a statement announcing her appointment. In November, the Alberta government abruptly ...

Mary McDougall of the Financial Times reports private equity portfolios underperform at big Canadian investors: Disappointing returns from private equity investments meant Canada’s big pension funds underperformed last year, as a downturn in the buyout sector weighed on some of the world’s largest investors in private assets. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan and Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec have all lagged their benchmarks over the past year, according to their latest reports. A rise in global borrowing costs in 2022 and 2023 ushered a more difficult period for private equity, with fundraising and exits sluggish, while public equity markets benefited from a long bull market that lifted many pension funds’ benchmarks. Despite a rocky period for private equity, the managers of the pension funds say their portfolios have performed as expected on a long-term view and are designed to rise less than wider stock markets in years of high...

Andrew Coyne wrote another highly critical article on CPP Investments claiming that 'overstaffed, overpaid and underperforming', the Fund is in need of a sharp course correction:  This time they waited until page 41 to admit it. As with most things at the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, its annual reports have become increasingly bloated over the years. Once, the organization responsible for investing Canadians’ public pension savings reported on its activities each year in a relatively straightforward fashion. The typical CPPIB annual report in those days was a relatively restrained 15,000 to 20,000 words. That was before 2006, when the CPP’s surplus funds were still invested passively, that is in a way designed to track the broad market indexes. In that year, the fund switched to active management: picking individual stocks, bonds and other assets in an attempt to beat the market. Since then the fund’s annual reports have become, essentially, extended adve...

On Sunday, CDPQ issued a press release stating  Marc-André Blanchard is leaving the organization to serve Canada: CDPQ acknowledges the significant contribution of Marc-André Blanchard, Executive Vice-President and Head of CDPQ Global and Global Head of Sustainability, who announced today his departure to take on the role of Chief of Staff to the Prime Minister of Canada, Mr. Mark Carney. Arriving at CDPQ in 2020, Marc-André Blanchard has profoundly impacted the organization. A former Canadian Ambassador to the United Nations and a recognized leader in the private sector, he has leveraged his expertise to serve CDPQ's international ambitions and sustainable development strategy. Under his leadership, CDPQ Global was established to support its investment teams on the ground through high-level relations with governments and partners worldwide in order to assist Québec companies in their globalization and to position CDPQ as...

Earlier today,CNBC's Morgan L Brennan sat down at the Reagan National Economic Forum with J.P. Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon to discuss tariffs, China, U.S. policy and more. The Reagan Foundation made the entire interview available and I highly recommend you watch it all below. This is by far Dimon's best interview, he didn't hold back one bit discussing everything from the "enemies within," why the USD will not remain the reserve currency, why immigration, education and taxation policies need to be reformed, why the Biden administration wasted billions on the green economy, why China remains a powerhouse no matter what tariffs the US government imposes, why bond vigilantes are back, why pension funds have abdicated their fiduciary duty, blindly following ISS on proxy votes and a lot more . He also discusses private equity and the rise in private credit and why we need better regulations there.  He doesn't hold back one bit, everyone should watch this interview, no B...