Q&A with our Chief Investment Officers

At a glance

• Stephen McLennan highlights three major themes that shaped Ontario Teachers’ investment activities: geopolitics, cost of capital and technology.  
• As active investors and owners, Gillian Brown discusses how Ontario teachers’ works closely with companies to build and protect value. 
• Entering 2026, Ontario Teachers’ is in a position of strength with a healthy funding surplus and a balanced portfolio. A strong liquidity position and recent realizations put the company in a good position to deploy capital into attractive opportunities in high-growth areas and sectors with deep expertise and capabilities. 

In today’s global environment, uncertainty is no longer a periodic headwind but a defining feature of the investment landscape. Against this backdrop, our Chief Investment Officers, Gillian Brown and Stephen McLennan, reflect on 2025 and our approach to building a portfolio that is resilient by design and positioned for the future.

Q: What were the major themes shaping our investment activities in 2025? 

Stephen McLennan: 2025 was marked with a complex and unpredictable environment. We believe the more stable global operating environment of the past has fundamentally changed, being redefined by multiple forces at once. There are three major themes impacting markets that I would highlight: geopolitics, the cost of capital, and technology.  

On the geopolitical front, shifts toward a more “America First” policy influenced global investors and businesses. Changes such as higher tariffs, evolving supply chains, and more complex trade relationships introduced additional uncertainty into the global outlook. At the same time, geopolitical and trade tensions remained elevated, continuing to shape the broader investment environment. The cost of capital, while it has tempered some, remains elevated when compared to recent history. This changes the calculus on many underwriting decisions and has suppressed returns across the portfolio. 

With technology, the rapid rise of artificial intelligence has fundamentally altered the investing landscape. The question we are asking ourselves, and building into our investment strategy, is who the winners will be from AI, where additional value can be extracted and created, and how we can use it to drive better business decisions and outcomes.   

Q: How did the portfolio perform in 2025?

Gillian Brown: Against this backdrop, we generated a total-fund net return of 6.7%. We saw strong results in venture growth, public equities, credit and gold, but those gains were partly offset by weaker performance in private equity and real estate. Overall, the year demonstrated the benefits of having a well-diversified portfolio, which helps us deliver stable returns while managing risk across different market environments.   

Performance versus our benchmarks continued to be a challenge. While some areas, like venture growth, public equities and credit, exceeded their benchmarks, the fund as a whole fell short. This stemmed from sectoral headwinds in private assets, underperformance from some of our portfolio companies and strong returns from our benchmarks, many of which are linked to public markets.  

Q: 2025 brought headwinds in private markets. Given their importance to the plan, what shifts, if any, are you making to support performance of the portfolio?

Gillian: Many private asset classes are facing industry-wide sectoral headwinds, and in some cases, asset-specific challenges, that require active hands-on work to address. If you take private equity, for instance, investors across the spectrum, including ourselves, are dealing with a less liquid market for both acquisitions and exits, higher interest rates, and greater competition for the best deals. 

As active investors and owners, we are working closely with our companies to build and protect value.  Examples of how we are doing that include deepening our value creation capabilities to improve our company’s operational performance, prioritizing investment in areas where we have an edge, and using technology and data more effectively to drive insights and productivity. 

We are also excited to have appointed new leaders in a number of asset classes including Equities (Dale Burgess), Infrastructure & Natural Resources (Christopher Metrakos) and Real Estate (Jenny Hammarlund). All three have a successful track record at Ontario Teachers’, substantial experience investing in private markets, and are well placed to oversee successful execution of our investment plan.

Q: Looking ahead, where do you see the most attractive investment opportunities for the fund?

Stephen: We aim to build a resilient portfolio that performs well through cycles. This means being thoughtful and agile with our asset allocation, including the split between active and passive investment strategies in the portfolio. 

We enter 2026 in a position of strength with a healthy funding surplus and a balanced portfolio. A strong liquidity position and recent realizations put us in a good position to deploy capital into attractive opportunities in high-growth areas and sectors where we have deep expertise and capabilities. Artificial intelligence and broader technology continue to be a long-term driving force, and we seek balanced exposure to this through public markets as well as our venture growth team and technology-enabling businesses like data centres. 

Energy also remains a significant investment opportunity as the increasing global desire for energy security and resilience requires significant capital in areas like energy transition and electricity transmission and distribution. These are just some examples, and we continue to look for broader opportunities across our investment universe.  

We are optimistic about the opportunities ahead. With the systems, people and partners we have in place, we believe the fund is well positioned to seize opportunities and deliver long-term value for members.