Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan

The Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan (HOOPP) is a defined benefit (DB) pension plan that has been helping build the foundation for a financially secure retirement for Ontario’s healthcare workers. The reason HOOPP has been the leading defined benefit pension plan provider in the Ontario healthcare community is simple: the Plan is tailored to the healthcare sector and offers its members retirement income for life. HOOPP members make regular contributions over the length of their career. When they retire, they receive a monthly income based on how much they earned and how many years they contributed. They will not outlive their pension. At HOOPP, our driving purpose is to provide healthcare workers with a financially secure retirement. We manage all aspects of the HOOPP pension plan for healthcare workers; we not only administer the Plan but we also invest member and employer contributions into the HOOPP Fund to ensure that pensions can be paid now and into the future. With more than $104 billion in assets, HOOPP is one of the largest DB pension plans in Ontario, and in Canada. Our proven strategy and track record of investment returns drive our plan performance, making HOOPP a leader among its global peers. HOOPP is fully funded which means it has more than enough assets to pay pension benefits owed to members today, and in the future. The HOOPP real estate portfolio forms a significant part of the Fund’s asset base. In addition to acting as an element of diversification, the income and cash flow generated by the properties plays an important role in helping meet both current and future obligations to our members. These income streams also have a high degree of reliability and, in times of inflation, can act as a good hedge as rental values increase. This makes real estate a good match for long-term liabilities. Over the last five years, our real estate portfolio generated a currency-hedged return of 8.2%, $1.8 billion over the benchmark. In 2020, the portfolio produced a return of 0.2% on a currency-hedged basis, and $499 million in value added. At year-end, our real estate portfolio had a gross market value of $15.5 billion versus $14.6 billion at the end of 2019. Despite the pandemic causing global commercial real estate transaction volumes to decline by over 30% from 2019 levels, our transaction activity during the year included approximately $2.1 billion in new investments and commitments. Dispositions of non-core assets totaled $340 million.