In Wake of Brussels Attack, Ontario Teachers Pension Still High on Infrastructure

The Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan owns a 39 percent stake in the Brussels Airport that was the location of a recent terrorist attack.

The pension fund owns large stakes in a handful of airports around Europe, and is one of the largest infrastructure investors in the world.

But the recent Brussels attack, and the specter of terror in general, isn’t going to deter the pension fund from continuing to invest in infrastructure.

From the Financial Post:

“It’s not changed our view on infractructure, it’s not changed our view on the role, the important role, that infrastructure plays in satsfiying our liabilities,” Teachers’ CEO Ron Mock said during a media briefing Thursday to discuss the plan’s performance in 2015.

“We remain completely firm on infrastructure as an investment and we continue to scour the world for the right opportunities and will continue to do that,” he said, adding that the pension plan remains “100 per cent” committed to owning airports within the pension plan’s portfolio.

Mock said the threat of a terrorist attack is “one of many risks” taken into consideration when Teachers’ makes an investment, whether it is in an infrastructure asset like an airport, or a large real estate asset such as a shopping centre.

[…]

“There is a whole human side of this that has to be thought through carefully, just in terms of people and personnel adjusting to what took place, as you can imagine,” he said. “So they’re pretty much focused on that and we’ve been in touch with the prime minister’s office, offering our support and our sympathies, and of course we’ve told the board and the CEO that we are behind them.”

Ontario Teachers’ infrastructure portfolio totals $15.7 billion, and returned 21.4 percent in 2015.

Photo by Christian Junker via Flickr CC License