Our approach
Using a holistic investment approach, our dedicated local fixed income investment team is fully integrated into an extensive global fixed income platform and places a strong emphasis on portfolio construction and risk. Our investment objective is to outperform the FTSE TMX Canadian Bond Universe on both a relative and risk-adjusted basis over a full market cycle.
Potential benefits of Canadian Core investment
We aim to provide enhanced and consistent long-term returns that are less reliant on market directionality with lower volatility and improved downside protection. Our key differentiators are:
Portfolio construction
We look to maximize portfolio efficiency, a portfolio’s return potential for a given set of risk constraints. By maximizing efficiency, it is possible to exploit the structural inefficiencies of an index (or market) and leverage broad idiosyncratic mispricing with minimal risk. While this focus on efficiency may appear intuitive, it can allow investors to uncover and take advantage of many non-intuitive positioning opportunities.
Connected thinking
We have an established investment team in Canada, complemented by robust global credit investment resources, who assess investment opportunities and risks from a Canadian perspective. Our common investment language, based on a framework of macro economic factors, fundamentals, valuations and thematics (“MFVT”) ensures that we capture the most efficient & reliant opportunities, both market and credit, within our portfolios.
Resilience targeting
Staying honest to fixed income’s purpose. Resilience targeting is about choosing the ‘efficient’ portfolio that best leverages our central investment thesis but will not be materially affected should the thesis fail to deliver. This helps build strong downside protection and positive asymmetry in expected returns for the portfolio.
Explore our Canadian Fixed Income range
Our longstanding team of portfolio managers follow a consistent approach across our range of Canadian fixed income capabilities, including our pooled funds and separate managed strategies.
Aviva Investors Canadian Core Plus
This strategy aims to provide enhanced and consistent long-term returns that are less reliant on market directionality with lower volatility, improved downside protection and better issuer diversification through global investments. Our investment objective is to outperform the FTSE TMX Canadian Bond Universe by 100bps over a full market cycle. High Yield exposure is limited to a maximum of 20% of the portfolio.
Aviva Investors Canadian Core Plus Climate Transition
This strategy aims to provide investors with a dual outcome of outperforming the FTSE TMX Canadian Bond Universe by 80bps over a full market cycle, while allocating to those companies that are doing the most to support solutions, or managing the risks and opportunities, associated with climate
Investment insights
Investment thinking that brings together the collective insight of Aviva Investors’ teams from across the globe on the key themes influencing markets.
Views
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Making cash work harder in Canada
16 Oct 2026
Elevated levels of cash and short-term assets on Canadian institutions’ balance sheets highlight the need for a middle-ground solution.
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The week in markets: The chips are down
16 Oct 2026
Investors were caught between hotter US inflation and economic data and growing nerves around the sustainability of the AI investment boom.
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Are we there yet? How road transport is evolving
8 Oct 2026
Electric and self-driving cars, batteries and robotics are progressing in leaps and bounds. Our experts discuss the investment implications.
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Bond Voyage: Beyond capital relief: securitisation reforms and insurer portfolios
8 Oct 2026
Securitisation offers insurers diversification, varied collateral pools and attractive spreads, yet remains underrepresented as allocations depend on more than returns and capital charges.
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Global and active: Fiscal risks strengthen the case for a global allocation to sovereign bonds
7 Oct 2026
With government deficits under the spotlight, fixed income investors need to think globally and take an active approach to allocations.
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Bond Voyage: When private credit moves public markets
10 Sep 2026
Private credit should no longer be treated as a separate asset class beyond public investors’ field of view – it is part of the same ecosystem, influencing price discovery, transfer of risk and recovery outcomes.
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AI boom highlights a flawed bond market
1 Sep 2026
Investors in passive bond funds are being exposed to more risk than they may appreciate as US technology giants turn to fixed income markets to fund massive spending on AI data centres, argues Aviva Investors chief executive Mark Versey.
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UK and EU sustainability regulations: Could a narrow focus be missing the bigger picture?
27 Aug 2026
Regulation must recognise that sustainable investing incorporates more than the provision of sustainable funds alone.
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Investment diversification: Still the only free lunch?
26 Aug 2026
Diversification has always been at the heart of asset management, but recent turmoil, from higher inflation to conflict, trade barriers and the AI revolution, is roiling markets. Can investors still reap its benefits?
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Bond Voyage: The role of investment research in the age of AI
11 Aug 2026
Artificial intelligence (AI) is already helping research analysts work more efficiently, but could it ultimately replace them?
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From volatility to stability: Enhancing portfolio resilience in insurance investment
5 Aug 2026
Insurers have long navigated a distinctive set of investment challenges, what can they do to build portfolios resilient enough for today's volatile environment?
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The case for ReturnPlus: A capital-efficient enhanced liquidity strategy
29 Jul 2026
The ReturnPlus strategy invests in a broad range of liquidity sub-asset classes, while consuming limited regulatory capital. Our ReturnPlus team explores the potential benefits for investors.
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Bond Voyage: Hyperscalers: A scramble to raise capital
9 Jul 2026
Giant tech companies are increasingly turning to international markets as they look to finance trillions of dollars of investment in AI infrastructure over the coming years. And they are doing so at accelerated speeds and scale.
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Taking the leap: Incorporating climate in core investment-grade allocations
16 Jun 2026
How can investors align their credit allocations to net-zero commitments and maintain returns?
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Confidence in a changing climate
15 Jun 2026
How can institutions forge impactful climate strategies that are right for them and their end beneficiaries? Our “Confidence in a changing climate” guide showcases some of the solutions we have developed to help.
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Bond Voyage: Why repo is quietly becoming one of the most important issues for investors
9 Jun 2026
As central banks unwind quantitative easing (QE), liquidity is increasingly being provided through repo operations instead of continuous asset purchases by the banks. How resilient is this new approach?
Bond Voyage
Bond Voyage: A journey into fixed income
Each month, our freewheeling fixed-income newsletter gathers insights from our high-yield, investment-grade, emerging-market and global sovereign bond teams.
House view
House View
Market insights, economic analysis and investment perspectives to help investors understand the trends, risks and opportunities shaping global markets.
Key risks
Fixed income investments have a reputation for safety but are not without risks. The risks below are illustrative. Other risks also exist. For further information, please contact our investment team.
Interest rate risk
Changes in interest rates are one of the most important factors that could affect the value of an investment. Rising interest rates tend to cause the prices of fixed income securities to fall. Callable fixed income debt securities are likely to be called when interest rates are falling because the issuer can refinance at a lower rate. This strategy will make the use of bond futures or forwards to minimize unintended interest rate risk when making an allocation to non-Canadian dollar securities.
Foreign exchange risk
All exposures to fluctuations in foreign currency movement against the Canadian dollar will be substantially hedged by use of currency forwards.
Credit risk
The credit rating or financial condition of an issuer may affect the value of a fixed income debt security. Generally, the lower the quality rating of a security, the greater the expected risk that the issuer will fail to pay interest fully and return principal in a timely manner. Adverse economic conditions or changing circumstances may weaken the capacity of the issuer to pay interest and repay principal and may cause a security to lose some or all of its value.
Liquidity risk
All investments carry liquidity risk, that is the risk that a security will not be able to be sold in a timely and cost- effective manner. An investment may be less liquid if it is not widely traded and such investments may experience significant deviations in pricing from their fundamental intrinsic value. As all bond market securities, Canadian fixed income instruments are subject to liquidity risk. Liquidity in the government of Canada and provincial bond market is relatively high, while liquidity in the Canadian investment-grade corporate bond market is moderate. Liquidity in the global high-yield bond market is poor to moderate. Liquidity risk will vary with changes in market tone and macro risk.
Canadian portfolio management team
Sunil Shah
Head of Canadian Fixed Income & Senior Portfolio Manager
Nayeem Islam
Portfolio Manager
Trevor Li
Portfolio Manager & Senior Research Analyst
Explore
Canadian fixed income
A range of strategies aiming to provide enhanced and consistent long-term returns with lower volatility and improved downside protection.