The Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec is set to lag its peers with weak returns for 2009, according to the province's association of public sector retirees.
The group says a document it obtained under the access to information law indicates that a key fund managed by the Caisse - the Régie des rentes du Québec, or provincial pension plan - posted a weak 6.55-per-cent return for the first 11 months of 2009.
Based on that preliminary return, l'Association québécoise des retraité(e)s des secteurs public et parapublic (AQRP) says the Caisse is headed for a total 2009 return on all the funds it manages of between 6 per cent and 7 per cent.
That compares poorly with the forecast return calculated by pension fund experts of between 10 per cent and 15 per cent for the other big Canadian pension funds, said AQRP president Madelaine Michaud.
"This is troubling. It leaves us to conclude that the Caisse has not been making the kinds of investments in the past year to keep up with the others, let alone get out of the hole it's in," she said in an interview yesterday.
But Caisse spokesman Maxime Chagnon said the retiree group's numbers are incomplete because they are based on partial information.
"This is not a snapshot that accurately reflects our portfolio for the year, which ended Dec. 31," he said.
The full story will be known when the Caisse unveils its financial results for the year at the end of February or early March, Mr. Chagnon said.
The Caisse posted a massive 25-per-cent loss - about $40-billion - on its investments in 2008, compared with the average return for its peers of -18 per cent.
Ms. Michaud said the Caisse appears to have missed out on the stock market rebound in 2009 and expressed concern that the institution may never make up for the enormous losses of 2008.
Among the factors she cited for the Caisse's seemingly below-par performance in 2009 are some high-risk real estate investments and the continued fallout from the hug bet it placed in the problematic, non-bank asset-backed commercial paper market.
Bertrand Marotte