UPDATE 1-Canada's CPPIB notches 1.6 pct gain in fiscal 2nd qtr

(Adds details from interview, background)
By Euan Rocha
TORONTO, Nov 12 (Reuters) - The Canada Pension Plan
Investment Board, one of the world's biggest pension funds,
reported gross investment returns of 1.6 percent in its fiscal
second quarter on Thursday, driven largely by a boost in net
investment income.
CPPIB, which manages Canada's national pension fund and is a
major global dealmaker, said it ended the period on Sept. 30
with net assets of C$272.9 billion ($205 billion). That compared
with C$268.6 billion at the end of the previous quarter.
"Despite significant declines across all major global equity
markets and mixed results in fixed income markets this quarter,
the CPP Fund showed a modest gain," noted CPPIB Chief Executive
Mark Wiseman, in a statement, adding that diversification of the
portfolio across geographies and asset classes had contributed
to the fund's resiliency.
The pension fund has about 50 percent of its portfolio in
public and private equities. It has roughly 30 percent invested
in fixed income products and about 20 percent in real assets
like real estate and infrastructure.
In an interview on Thursday afternoon, Wiseman said that the
fund manager is now looking more at diversifying within those
three asset classes rather than moving money from one bucket to
another, given the vast size of those pools of capital.
"We're investing in things like drug royalties, technology
royalties, and patent rights that help diversify the portfolio,"
said Wiseman.
He said the fund has no plans to invest in niche areas like
art or wine, but he playfully mused that such investments could
have certain merits.
"We are looking at additional asset classes, but for us it
is not the more esoteric things like art and wine, though from a
personal perspective there's some benefit to being able to drink
your investment if it doesn't work out well."
($1 = 1.3331 Canadian dollars)