After reaching a near 40-year high over the past year, headline inflation started to cool in the final months of 2022 following a series of aggressive interest rate hikes by the Bank of Canada. According to Statistics Canada, the consumer price index was up 6.3 per cent year over year in December, down from a […]
To bolster Alaska’s public sector, a bipartisan effort is underway to relaunch the state’s pensions as defined benefit plans. “I’m carrying this bill on behalf of thousands of state employees who have worked for more than a decade to refine it,” said Cathy Giessel, leader of the state senate’s Republican majority during her introduction of […]
Amid the unprecedented events of the last three years, the Colleges of Applied Arts and Technology pension plan has remained on course with its investment strategies, according to Asif Haque, the plan’s chief investment officer. “We held our focus on the key goal of the CAAT’s investment program. . . . The plan’s diversified asset […]
Finance’s toughest problem just got a whole lot trickier, thanks to the quandary of inflation. Legendary economist William F. Sharpe sealed his place in history when he collected the 1990 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his work on investment decision-making, but in defined contribution pension circles, the emeritus professor at Stanford University is […]
BluePrint CPAs is offering a paid gym membership exclusively to its in-office employees as part of the firm’s strategy to encourage a healthy workplace and incentivize in-person work. The Chatam, Ont.-based firm is also offering one paid hour per day for exercise, but employees can allot two hours per day to be out of the […]
The Pension Investment Association of Canada is prioritizing the protection of employment-based pension coverage in 2023. “Our members are concerned that well-intentioned regulatory changes, such as Bill C-228, may actually diminish employers’ support for pensions,” says Graeme Hay (pictured), the PIAC’s new chair and chief investment officer at Manitoba’s Teachers’ Retirement Allowances Fund, referring to a […]
Samantha Cleyn joins BMO Global Asset Management (BMO GAM) as Managing Director, Head of Institutional Sales & Service from T. Rowe Price Canada where she managed the firm’s institutional efforts nationally. Samantha is a recognized leader in the Canadian institutional asset management community. Her breadth of experience includes 11 years as a senior investment consultant […]
OVERVIEW AGENDA SPEAKERS ACTIVITIES LOCATION POST EVENT COVERAGE Speaker Jonathan Barry, managing director, head of client solutions, investment solutions group, MFS Investment Management Jonathan Barry is managing director and head of client solutions in the investment solutions group at MFS Investment Management. In the role, he’s responsible for working with pension plan sponsor clients to […]
The uncertainty about the direction interest rates will move in 2023 means defined benefit pension plan sponsors should be reconsidering their asset allocation strategies, says Ben Ukonga, principal at Mercer. “I don’t think anybody knows when, or if, interest rates will come down. If [inflation] comes down, the Bank of Canada’s likely to stop increasing […]
The average solvency ratio of Canadian defined benefit pension plans grew by 10 per cent in 2022, according to a new report by Mercer Canada. The report, which looked at the overall 2022 performance of more than 500 Canadian DB plans in the consultancy’s pension database, found the median solvency ratio reached 113 per cent […]