Pension wealth grew 6.8% in nominal terms in 2017, to $3,839 billion by the end of the year, following an increase of 3.5% in 2016, Statistics Canada said Friday.
More than half of the $246 billion increase came from increasing asset prices, which added $132.9 billion in wealth. Additionally, investment income grew 2.2% in 2017, and contributions rose handily, too, thanks to improving job market conditions.
All three pension tiers (social security plans, employer-based pension plans, and individual registered savings plans) posted gains in wealth from 2016 to 2017.
During 2017, the wealth of social security plans rose 13.2% to $410.3 billion, after increasing 6.1% in 2016. Both the Canada Pension Plan (+12.9%) and the Quebec Pension Plan (+14.6%) were up due to strong performance in equity markets
The value of individual registered plans rose by 7.1% during the year to $1.2 trillion. Employer-based pension plans ranked last in terms of growth rate, rising by 5.6% to $2.2 trillion.
Contributions also grew fastest for social security plans (5.5%) in 2017, StatsCan says, followed closely by employer pensions (5.2%), with individual registered plans a distant third (2.5%).
On the strength of that robust growth, the ratio of total pension wealth to household net worth also grew from 34.5% at the end of 2016 to 35.3% at the end of 2017, StatsCan says.