The Colleges of Applied Arts and Technology Pension Plan reported a robust 15.2% investment return for 2024, raising its asset value to C$23.3 billion ($16.8 billion) and increasing its funded ratio to 124%.
“All asset classes in the plan’s portfolio contributed positively to performance during 2024,” CAAT Pension Plan CIO Asif Haque said in a statement.
Despite the strong performance, the pension fund underperformed its policy benchmark’s 18.0% return. However, its five- and 10-year annualized returns of 9.7% and 9.6%, respectively, beat its benchmark’s returns of 8.5% and 8.1%, respectively, over those time periods.
Toronto-based CAAT—which was created to support colleges in Ontario but has since expanded to include workers from more than 20 industries—added that its active management program outperformed its policy benchmark by 1.5% annually, net of fees.
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Public equities were the pension fund’s top-performing asset class by far, with a 28.9% return, which translated into a C$7.45 billion gain. Commodities and private equity earned 16.9% and 16.0%, respectively, contributing C$1.02 billion and C$4.89 billion, respectively. CAAT’s credit portfolio gained 11.3%, or C$1.61 billion, while real assets returned 4.6%, adding almost C$4 billion to the 2024 return. Nominal bonds gained 4.2%, or C$2.88 billion, while inflation-linked bonds returned 4.0%, or C$1.41 billion.
As of the end of 2024, CAAT’s asset allocation was 32% public equity, 21% private equity, 17% real assets, 13% nominal bonds, 7% credit, 6% inflation-linked bonds and 4% commodities. One year earlier, the asset allocation was 30% public equity, 21% private equity, 19% real assets, 13% nominal bonds, 6% credit, 6% inflation-linked bonds, and 5% commodities.
The pension fund also announced an increase in its exposure to the U.S. dollar to C$10.03 billion in 2024 from C$8.17 billion in 2023, as a hedging strategy to manage risk. However, this could end up backfiring, as the U.S. dollar continues to weaken and is down 7.7% year-to-date in 2025, according to the DXY dollar index. CAAT management noted in the fund’s 2024 annual report that 5% of the U.S. dollar’s depreciation came after the U.S. election and amid pending tariffs, which dampened investor sentiment
“As we continue to manage long-term risks, we do so in an increasingly challenging market environment,” CAAT CEO Derek Dobson said in a statement.
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Tags: 2024 performance, CAAT, Colleges of Applied Arts and Technology, Derek Dobson
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