By David G. Barry
The Public
Sector Pension Investment Board, one of Canada’s largest pension funds,
has named a senior executive at another Canadian pension fund as its new
president and CEO.
Deborah K. Orida, a senior manager director with the Canada Pension Plan
Investment Board (CPP Investments), will take the reins of the CA$230.5 billion
(US$178.5 billion) fund on Sept. 1. She will succeed Neil Cunningham,
who will become vice chair and special advisor to the president and CEO.
Cunningham announced in February that he would retire on March 31, 2023, after 19
years at the firm including four as CIO.
Orida has 25 years of experience in the investment and finance industry and
served as global head of real assets and chief sustainability officer at CPP
Investments. In that role, she led the global real assets departments that
encompassed infrastructure, sustainable energies, real estate, sustainable
investing, and portfolio value creation.
In a prepared statement, PSP Investments Chair Martin J. Glynn said the fund’s
board “unanimously” agreed that Orida was “ideally qualified to lead PSP
Investments forward into its next phase of growth and strategic evolution.”
For the fiscal year ended March 31, PSP Investments posted a 10.9% return and
grew assets under management by 12.7%. Based in Ottawa, PSP was established in
1999 and manages and invests capital transferred to it by the Government of
Canada for the pension plans of the federal Public Service, the Canadian
Forces, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and the Reserve Force. It has its
principal business office in Montreal and offices in New York, London and Hong
Kong.