With so many consumers turning to online shopping during the coronavirus pandemic, factories and fulfillment centres faced an acute labour shortage. A new generation of robots, built on recent advances in AI, helped address this. In this keynote address, Ken Goldberg will discuss how further developments in robotics will lead to a world where robots free us to focus on what we do best – empathizing, communicating and innovating.

Speaker: Ken Goldberg, award-winning roboticist, professor and William S. Floyd Jr. distinguished chair in engineering, University of California, Berkeley

Climate change will likely have a long-term impact on returns. In this session, Soami Kohly and Colin Sinclare will discuss the challenges that climate risk present for Canadian fixed income, how to manage those risks and how active management can play a role in affecting change over the long-term.

Soami Kohly, fixed income portfolio manager, MFS Investment Management

As deglobalization entrenches itself, the global tide no longer lifts all boats. China’s pursuit of a dual-circulation growth strategy focused on consumption and self-sufficiency is unlikely to promote as much growth in other economies world as its traditional approach. In this session, Alexis Freyeisen will discuss the economies with strong domestic structural growth stories that are most likely to perform well against this backdrop in the medium term.

Speaker: Alexis Freyeisen, investment strategist, emerging markets equities, AllianceBernstein

As their allocations to private markets grow larger, many institutional investors are considering innovative thematic ideas to build diversified and non-correlated portfolios. Opportunities exist in emerging markets, digital infrastructure, energy transition, early-stage ventures, proptech and blockchain, as well as credit strategies such as government claims and media royalties. This session will aim to provide an overview of strategies being used to provide diversification and increase returns in the current market environment.

Speaker: Nelson Lam, senior vice-president, equity and alternative investments, Trans-Canada Capital

Underinvestment in both oil and gas markets has led to an inflexible conventional energy system. This will result in higher than expected prices for the foreseeable future. In this session, Mark Lacey will discuss how these higher prices will be accompanied by a greater amount of redirected capital towards the energy transition technologies and what investors should know.

Speaker: Mark Lacey, head of global resource equities and global thematics, Schroders

In the global fight against climate change, investing in technologies and solutions that mitigate the pace of climate change and help global communities adapt to evolving realities will generate a new source of financial return – climate alpha. This session will explore how integrating financial capital, human capital and natural capital can deliver both superior financial returns as well as authentic sustainable impact returns.

Speaker: Patrick Vizzone, managing director, global private equity, Franklin Templeton

Fixed income impact investing has tremendous potential to address some of the world’s greatest challenges, though common misconceptions have often surrounded it. During this session, Matt Lawton will dispel four common misconceptions of this exciting and growing corner of the market.

Speaker: Matt Lawton, fixed income portfolio manager, global impact credit strategy, T. Rowe Price

Today’s high inflation and rising rates environment means considerable risks for investors. Alternative fixed income, including multi-asset credit strategies, could provide diversifying characteristics while maintaining attractive yields when compared to traditional fixed income. In this session, Steve Guignard will discuss the diversity of the alternative fixed income space and how its various asset classes can offer investors the benefits of shorter duration exposure, stable income streams and strong alpha generation potential.

Speaker: Steve Guignard, senior director of client solutions, Sun Life Capital Management

Canadian institutional investors are consistently presented with new investment ideas and solutions, from cryptocurrency and block chain technology, to fintech. While these are interesting and potentially rewarding, they have yet to reliably withstand the increasingly challenging current macroeconomic environment of 40-year highs in inflation, central banks rapidly tightening monetary policy and global growth concerns, including recession. After the significant market downturn in risk assets during the first half of 2022 and the potential economic maelstrom that lies ahead, sometimes returning to traditional assets such as high yield credit, particularly using newly available technology, like quantitative modeling, and existing market data and tools, such as exchange-traded funds (ETFs), can provide an effective escape for investors to continue the path toward their financial objectives. In this session, Paul Benson will guide institutional investors as they continue to search for attractive risk/reward profiles in financial assets amid a challenging market environment.

Speaker: Paul Benson, head of efficient beta, Insight Investment

Will history repeat itself? This session will share a global macro outlook and leading analysis of financial market trends, what history can teach us and how these insights can inform asset allocation decisions for plan sponsors in the current environment and for years ahead.

Speaker: Jurrien Timmer, director of global macro, Fidelity Investments

This plan sponsor case study presentation will look at the top-down and bottom-up elements used by the University Pension Plan to establish its baseline, interim and long-term net-zero targets. It will also detail the connection between these targets and fiduciary duties.

Speaker: Aaron Bennett, chief investment officer, University Pension Plan Ontario