A Letter from the CEO

I want to begin by letting you know what a pleasure it is to write this letter. Our annual report is charting a new course this year, and with this comes the opportunity for me to provide you, our members, employers, sponsors, unions, associations and employees with a personal message and update on our progress.

When I became the OMERS President and CEO in 2020, one of my first conversations was with our Chief Financial & Strategy Officer, Jonathan Simmons, who shared, “Blake, I am so inspired to work here. OMERS is noble in its cause, local in its roots and global in its reach.” I find myself drawn back to these words time and again. It is a rarity to be able to work for an organization where the balance sheet is completely aligned with a true and meaningful cause in service of all of you; and yet, that is our honour and reality. That is why our global offices are lined with pictures of members on our walls. It is also why it means so much to us when OMERS members indicate that they are exceptionally pleased with our relationship, as they did in 2025, affording us a 97% member satisfaction rating. Our members play a vital role in supporting our Ontario communities every day, and for nearly 65 years, we have had the privilege and responsibility of serving them and fulfilling our commitment to their retirement security, a commitment we have always upheld, and always will. A promise is a promise.

I am often told that Canada’s largest pension plans are the envy of the world. Knowing OMERS and our peers as I do, I would say that this is an accurate statement and the respect with which we are held globally is second to none. But, moreover, when I speak to our teams here at OMERS, I tell them that our goal is “to be the envy of the envy of the world.” We have the capabilities, the talent and the resources to continue to get better in everything we do, including serving you and protecting the Plan against downside risk. This includes when the world faces turbulent and uncertain times, as we experienced in 2025. So much changed in the course of last year, and just like you, we felt these impacts across the organization. With this in mind, now feels like the perfect time to speak with all of you directly on how we are dealing with these changes, how and where they impacted our results in 2025, and why we are so confident about our ability to navigate the future well – and on your behalf.

Our 2025 Results

OMERS performance in 2025 demonstrates the resilience of our plan in the context of a turbulent market environment and the disciplined approach that continues to deliver long-term value for our 665,000 members. Our net return for 2025 was 6.0%, adding $8.2 billion to the Plan. Our net assets grew from $138.2 billion at December 31, 2024, to $145.2 billion at December 31, 2025. Putting these results into a longer-term context, we have delivered a five‑year average return of 7.7% and an average return of 7.1% over 10 years.

In 2025, the Plan’s smoothed funded ratio improved by 1% to 99% using a real discount rate of 3.70%. This year-over-year improvement occurred despite our decision to set aside an additional $2.2 billion for higher member life expectancy, as we continue on our prudent path to a strong future for the Plan.

Our diversification across asset classes and geographic regions has strategically positioned us to navigate an ever-changing global landscape. This approach to portfolio management served us well over the past year, allowing us to deliver steady performance amidst significant political and economic uncertainty. Our public equities delivered double-digit results, supported by another strong year for our private credit investments as an asset class, and the performance of Oxford’s portfolio has given us strong confidence that real estate has begun to recover as the market strengthens. Private equities continue to face a challenging market. Infrastructure delivered a positive return; while the majority of our portfolio performed well, some of our European and renewable energy assets softened the return from this asset class. We made prudent decisions to hedge currencies throughout the year, protecting 70 basis points of returns. This helped to limit the foreign exchange impact on our results to negative 1.3%, driven mainly by a significant decline in the value of the U.S. dollar.

These results were not achieved in a vacuum. In 2025, our teams navigated continued market instability, particularly around trade and heightened global tensions. Recognizing the impact of our changing global environment, we have adapted our risk framework and approach to help us navigate uncertainty going forward to meet our liabilities. We have streamlined our reporting and assessment processes, analyzed potential impacts from several economic scenarios in 2026, and remain focused through regular meetings between senior leadership and our Risk team. And while this allows us to mitigate risk in both the short and long term, I often say that “a quarter” at OMERS is 25 years, not three months. This sentiment is how we remain anchored to a long-term focus that we believe best serves the Plan and our members’ futures, as well as the futures of generations yet to come.

It is because of this responsibility to generations of members that we believe in looking at our performance over multiple years. Over the last 10 years, as noted above, we have averaged a net return of 7.1%, adding $73.9 billion to the Plan, and we expect to have $200 billion in net assets by 2030. We believe a balanced and diversified portfolio of high-quality assets will continue to sustain the Plan; but we also believe in looking through the windshield and not the rearview mirror. The current business climate in which we operate is highly unpredictable. While that can make the future appear more challenging, these factors can create opportunity and we are going to focus on controlling what happens here, for the benefit of our current and future members. We are strengthening and diversifying our portfolio and teams, and have our eye firmly on the long-term security of the Plan.

Serving Our Members

2025 also saw updated research from the Canadian Centre for Economic Analysis (CANCEA) on the impact OMERS has on our Ontario communities. This new report highlights the value of a defined benefit pension like OMERS in uncertain times, finding that our plan contributes $15.3 billion to Ontario’s economy and positively impacts 1 in 11 households. The report also identified what CANCEA is calling the “stability dividend,” with defined benefit pension members reporting life satisfaction at significantly higher rates than the general population. This positive impact extends to physical and mental health, where OMERS members report being in excellent or very good shape at a rate far higher than those who are not part of the Plan. The ability to have this kind of profound impact is something we do not take for granted, and are extremely proud to share with all of you.

To that end, in 2025, we continued to make improvements in the way we serve our members and employers. Of particular note are the measures we introduced to make leave purchases more accessible and affordable for all working members, creating more ways to build a better financial future by maximizing pension income in retirement. We refreshed and modernized our members’ website, implemented a retirement planner tool and travelled over 103,000 kilometres across Ontario to deliver education sessions. Over 40,000 members attended these sessions and other webinars. We also engaged with you in over 165,000 phone conversations. These connections matter, and bring to the forefront the importance of our relationship with all of you, across the many individuals and groups that comprise the OMERS community.

We continue to introduce new members to our plan and in 2025 saw more than 44,000 new enrolments. Many of these members are non-full-time working women, who chose to be part of our plan. To all of these new members, a warm and heartfelt welcome from our team!

We also reimagined how we communicate and connect with members, who range in age from 14 to 106, and employers, who are more than 1,000 strong. We expanded our volunteer research community and learned from their input, and will now be able to deliver more and improved products and services for members. We piloted a holistic retirement planning session with members nearing or entering retirement, and launched the Pensions Women’s Empowerment Initiative, reflecting our commitment to supporting women’s long-term financial well-being. We also released a third season of the popular Pension Blueprint podcast, exploring a range of relevant pension subjects alongside tailored financial literacy resources.

I would encourage our members to visit our myOMERS websiteOpens new window to learn about these and other initiatives underway to serve you better.

The People Behind the Plan

Results from our employees show that we are building the kind of culture where employees want to work. In addition to scoring as best-in-class in the categories of employee engagement, inclusion, growth & development and well-being, we ranked 7th on the Best Workplaces™ in Canada list.

We spent 2025 modernizing our systems and training our people for a future that is coming quickly. We are laying the groundwork today, enhancing our “digital fitness” across the organization, embracing the responsible use of AI, selectively and strategically building new areas of our investment platform, and enhancing our member services. We know that these improvements will pay dividends over the long term and our members will be the beneficiaries. Our ability to provide the best for members, employers and our investment portfolio means that we must attract, empower and retain a highly engaged and professional workforce, ensuring that they have the resources and tools to be their best on your behalf.

We expanded skills development offerings, establishing access to over 25,000 online courses for our employees. Our employee development program, Development Days, ensures our teams are supported as they build the skills necessary to have an impact in a rapidly changing world. We invested in specialized learning programs to build business and technical skills, and supported our leaders with individually tailored development programs. We are also keenly aware that employees need more than just skills to get the best out of themselves and each other. That is why we expanded our well-being offerings, rolling out programs related to mental and physical health to our teams around the globe.

We continue to prioritize inclusion as one of our values, because diverse and inclusive organizations are more innovative and perform better financially. The year 2025 saw the emergence of three additions to our existing six Employee Resource Groups (ERGs). ERGs are open to all employees and help build communities, networks and allyship across the organization. Our Enterprise Inclusion & Diversity Council is comprised of senior leaders from across business lines. I have been extremely proud to serve as Co-Chair of this group alongside our Chief Human Resources Officer, Dr. Nancy Nazer. We also enhanced our ongoing commitment to Indigenous reconciliation by launching new training in support of the National Commission on Truth and Reconciliation’s Call to Action #92.

We continue to build and shape a team that serves each of you, guided by our values of inclusion, integrity, excellence and humility, knowing that these values will inspire a team that will serve you well.

Our Responsibilities and Our Communities

So much of the uncertainty we have faced this year as Canadians, as you know, has been the result of tense, challenging and changing geopolitical relationships. I have been clear throughout 2025 that I am optimistic about our chances to invest and add even more value in our home market while honouring our fiduciary duty to members, and I believe this is a pivotal moment for this great country. As of year-end, more than $25 billion of our equity is proudly invested in Canadian assets. As Canada unites to build a stronger and more resilient future, OMERS wants to be a catalyst in helping unlock these aspirations. We have a strong home-country bias, with the advantage of strong local relationships and on-the-ground expertise. Of course, any transaction we undertake will have to meet the high bar we set for managing the Plan on a risk-adjusted basis, but I anticipate that near-term opportunities in Canada will support both our objectives and the country’s growth. We believe in this country, in its future and in the role we can play in making a difference.

Any plan for a resilient and bright future also needs to consider climate change. We continue to make important progress against the goals set out in our Climate Action Plan. OMERS is reporting a 65% reduction in its portfolio carbon emissions intensity relative to the 2019 baseline, and increased its green investments to $26 billion. As part of our long-term perspective, we are always looking at how to best create value and manage risks as new sustainability challenges and solutions emerge. Of particular importance was the introduction of an enterprise sustainability program for our internal operations. Across our enterprise, taking sustainability considerations into account has long been a part of how we work, how we develop and care for our people, how we contribute to our communities and how we operate our business. The articulation of this plan aligns our everyday work with our broader commitments.

Inspired by our members who dedicate their work to enhancing our communities, in 2025, our global teams continued to demonstrate their commitment to giving back by raising funds for local charities and volunteering time to support a range of meaningful initiatives. We packed and sorted food at local food banks, supported clothing drives, cleaned up parks and planted trees. Our tradition of supporting local initiatives is an essential part of who we are, and this commitment grows each year.

Our Future

Despite our meaningful accomplishments in 2025, creating value for our members and communities as we strengthened our team, the external challenges we were forced to contend with made for a challenging year. However, as a long-term investor, we will never be defined by a single year. Moreover, I believe that the groundwork OMERS laid last year was necessary in service of setting the Plan up for future sustainable success – for our 665,000 members and for all of those who will follow. Last year, we launched our 2030 Strategy, and I am pleased to say that we are on track to turn this strategy into a reality.

Each year, I have the opportunity to join OMERS Chief Pension Officer Celine Chiovitti as we meet with members from across the province in their communities. I often tell our team that I wish everyone in the organization could have the chance to do the same. Our members are the heart of their community; thoughtful, insightful and some of the bravest and most selfless people I have had the privilege to meet.

I return home each time refreshed and inspired by the fact that OMERS has the chance to make a difference in their lives. It is a rewarding opportunity, and one that our world-class teams are aware of each and every day.

While there is little likelihood that world events will settle into a stable, predictable state in the near future, we move forward with confidence, with purpose, and with determination. We will encounter obstacles, and we will continue to resolutely put one foot in front of the other, focusing on the areas where our deeply talented global teams can have the most positive impact. We will continue to operate every single day to secure the future our members deserve and expect, and to earn the trust of everyone reading this letter, in the hope that you are as proud to be part of the OMERS community as we are to work with and for it.

Thank you for that opportunity. We look forward to working more closely with all of you in the future, as we Build Tomorrow Together.

Blake Hutcheson
President & CEO
OMERS Administration Corporation