Ontario Teachers’ Names New CIO

The Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan has found a new chief investment officer. 

Ziad Hindo, who has worked at the Canadian pension fund since 2000, has been promoted to the role, Ontario Teachers’ announced Tuesday. Hindo previously led the C$189.5 billion ($148.1 billion USD) retirement fund’s capital markets group.

The former CIO, Bjarne Graven Larsen, resigned earlier this year after just two years in the role. According to an April statement from Ontario Teachers’, Larsen stepped down in order to return to his home in Denmark. 

[II Deep Dive: Ontario Teachers’ CIO Resigns]

In addition to appointing Hindo to the CIO position, the pension fund has promoted Jo Taylor, who has been the fund since 2012, to the newly created role of executive managing director of global development. He most recently ran the pension fund’s capabilities out of Hong Kong and London, according to Ontario Teachers’. 

“These appointments clearly demonstrate the strength of our pool of talent,” said Ron Mock, president and chief executive officer of the pension fund, in a statement. “Supported by their world-class teams, I am confident that Ziad and Jo will be very successful in advancing our investment strategy using a total fund approach and global mindset.”

Hindo’s previous roles at Ontario Teachers’s span both public and private markets. While head of the capital markets group, he integrated two departments on the trading floor “to execute a centralized trade strategy” at the pension fund, according to its website. 

His colleague Taylor has more than 30 years of investment experience, according to the fund, having spent 20 years with 3i Group plc, a private equity and infrastructure investor. Taylor currently serves on the boards of Camelot, Scotia Gas Networks, Burton’s Biscuits, and Ontario Airports Investments, according to the pension fund’s website. 

He will relocate from London to Toronto for his new role.

Ontario Teachers’ net return for the year ending December 31, 2017, was 9.7 percent, exceeding its benchmark of 8.2 percent. As of January, the pension was 105 percent funded.

The fund said in April that it would put a large portion of that money into a contingency reserve in case of a “severe market event.”