Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec today reported a return of 14.6% in 2006 on strong performances from its diversified real estate holdings and burgeoning private-equity portfolio.

“All the investment groups made a positive contribution to the Caisse’s absolute return and value
added. Their combined efforts enabled the Caisse to achieve this result in 2006,” said Henri-Paul Rousseau, president and CEO of the Caisse, in a news release.

The gain marks the third year in a row of robust, double-digit returns for the public pension fund manager.

The average return over the past three years is 13.8%, a result achieved by only 5% of large Canadian pension funds according to the Caisse.

For the year ended Dec. 31, the Caisse’s private-equity division returned 22%, outperforming the market index by 5.8%.

Its real estate division returned 20.2%, or 2.2% more than the market index.

Equities posted a return of 20.9%, or 1.9% more than the index.

Fixed income portfolios posted a combined return of 4%.

Total assets under management now stand at $237.3-billion.