Canada Pension Plan Investment Board tapped Franklin Resources Inc. executive Ben Meng, former chief investment officer of a major U.S. retirement system, to steer active strategies at Canada’s largest pension.
As head of investment portfolio management, Meng will help guide teams’ investments in stock plays, credit, private equity, infrastructure and other strategies designed to beat the market, according to people familiar with the matter. Those make up more than half of CPPIB’s C$700 billion of assets.
Meng reports to Ed Cass, CPPIB’s first dedicated investment chief. The pension has been enacting changes such as paring back its exposure to emerging markets and creating a new group to oversee some mature assets and potentially incubate new strategies, some of the people said, asking not to be identified discussing a confidential matter. It expects to have C$1 trillion of assets by 2033.
Meng declined to comment, as did spokespeople for CPPIB and Franklin.
In Meng, CPPIB is tapping a pension veteran who has left his mark on some of the world’s biggest and most complicated institutions. He was deputy CIO for the State Administration of Foreign Exchange — the agency in charge of China’s foreign reserves — and later the investment boss at the California Public Employees’ Retirement System.
Most recently, Meng was executive vice president and chairman of Asia Pacific at Franklin Templeton, overseeing strategy in the region. He also developed private equity and sustainability initiatives at the San Mateo, California-based mutual fund manager.
His departure is among several recent exits, as Franklin Templeton struggles to consolidate its disparate brands. Its Western Asset Management Co. unit has reported at least $120 billion of outflows after former star bond trader Ken Leech came under an enforcement investigation last year before being charged with criminal fraud.
‘Serving pensioners’
Known for his focus on mapping risks, Meng has stepped back into public sector. His role involves working closely with a team that manages the fund’s exposures and providing advice based on market data.
“His insatiable curiosity makes him a world-class investor,” said David Marchick, a former longtime Carlyle Group Inc. executive who’s now dean of the Kogod School of Business at American University. “And getting back to serving pensioners gets him back to his roots.”
From early 2019 to August 2020, Meng was CIO of Calpers, the largest public US pension fund. He focused on reversing the fund’s past streak of underperformance and centralized how the pension oversaw risk and liquidity. He also created a dedicated allocation to private credit, jettisoned underperforming stock pickers and brought active public strategies under in-house management.
His reform agenda at Calpers ended abruptly when state officials opened a review into whether his portfolio holdings violated conflict-of-interest rules when Calpers steered money into Blackstone Inc. when he owned stock. He chose to resign.
Meng had disclosed all stockholdings in line with the pension’s protocol and relied on Calpers to flag potential conflicts of interests that would require his recusal from investment decisions, according to documents. No evidence has surfaced that he intended to boost his personal holdings.
In an August 2020 meeting, some Calpers board and staff officials said the pension needed a more robust compliance process to guide personnel on how to manage potential conflicts, according to a transcript reviewed by Bloomberg.
Meng agreed to pay a $10,000 fine late last year to resolve the issue.
In a 2023 commencement speech at the University of California Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, he said his time as CIO at Calpers – and the returns he accomplished — marked one of his proudest professional moments.
Dawn Lim, Layan Odeh and Silla Brush, Bloomberg News
©2025 Bloomberg L.P.
