The Ontario Pension Board (OPB), the administrator of province’s Public Service Pension Plan (PSPP), ended 2013 with an annual investment return of 12.5%, exceeding its benchmark return by 3.1 percentage points.
Investment income during the year amounted to $2.24 billion, which included $550 million in value-added returns above the benchmark.
“Our 2013 annual investment return caps off a very successful five years for our investments team, with a compound annual rate of return of 9.1% over that period,” said Mark Fuller, president and CEO of the OPB. “Our compound annual rate of return since inception of 8.6% exceeds the annual rate of return of 5.95% required to fund the plan over the long term.”
The PSPP was 96% funded at the end of 2013 and finished the year with about $21 billion in assets.
Other factors that contributed to the improvement of the funded status of the PSPP include gains from continuing salary restraint in the public service in Ontario and low inflation.
“It was also a milestone year for OPB on the investment transaction front,” adds Fuller. “We participated in our largest investment transaction to date as part of the consortium that acquired Primaris Real Estate Investment Trust and, in the process, continued to build OPB’s reputation as a respected and desirable investment partner.”
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