A rainy-day investment

The Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan is best known for investing in boring but stable cash-producing assets like Copenhagen’s International Airport, Vancouver’s Pacific Centre mall and MLSE, owner of the Toronto Maple Leafs, which it sold last year. But Teachers’ recent deal to take a majority stake in Norwegian apparel-maker Helly Hansen (for an undisclosed sum) suggests an increasing appetite for risk in exchange for the possibility of bigger returns. The Oslo-based company is known for making sailing and other all-weather gear, but doesn’t have much of a following outside Europe—something Teachers’, with a portfolio of $117 billion, no doubt hopes to change. While there are no guarantees in the fickle world of fashion, the odds of Helly Hansen becoming a global powerhouse seem a lot better than a Stanley Cup coming to Toronto any time soon.