A year-long study lays out where funds land on the TPA spectrum and why
The International Centre for Pension Management (ICPM) says there is no single blueprint for the total portfolio approach, the investment model a growing number of pension and sovereign wealth funds are adopting in place of the long-standing strategic asset allocation (SAA) framework.
In a working group report released on July 7, ICPM maps the different ways funds put the total portfolio approach (TPA) into practice, laying out a spectrum that runs from "fully integrated" models to "partially integrated" ones, with hybrid variations in between.
The report describes this spectrum as descriptive rather than normative, noting that no single model is presented as universally superior and that different structures may suit different organizational and investment contexts.
The paper is the product of a year-long collaboration among nearly twenty pension and sovereign wealth fund leaders.
It was led by Adrian Trollor, the organization's managing director, with Trollor and Sebastien Betermier of McGill University serving as lead authors.
"There is a lack of clarity about what TPA is," despite the attention it draws, Trollor said in the report, pointing to the range of models pension and sovereign wealth funds have adopted.
The report shows leaders how funds worldwide are implementing TPA and the factors shaping each approach, he said.
Two of the five funds profiled as case studies are Canadian.
ICPM classifies OPTrust, which manages assets for Ontario public-sector members, as a hybrid model, and CPP Investments as a partially integrated model.
The Future Fund and Victorian Funds Management Corporation of Australia and the New Zealand Super Fund round out the studies.
OPTrust launched its version of TPA, called its Member-Driven Investment Strategy, in 2016.
The fund runs an integrated team across liquid and illiquid assets, holds roughly 73 percent of assets internally and manages a fund of about US$20bn.
CPP Investments sits toward the other end of the spectrum.
With more than 400 investment staff and about US$565bn in assets, the fund uses central teams for liquidity, foreign-exchange management and portfolio balancing, while asset-class leads retain autonomy to pursue alpha within their areas.
TPA rests on what ICPM calls enablers, essential components such as total portfolio thinking and supportive governance, and levers, variable components including risk factor models, incentive structures and delegation models.
How funds combine those levers determines where they land on the spectrum.
Adoption is climbing.
Citing a 2025 Thinking Ahead Institute study of 26 asset owners, the report notes that 35 percent had adopted TPA and 54 percent were moving in that direction.
A separate ICPM survey in Vancouver in October 2025 found about one-third of 38 participating funds described their approach as TPA.
ICPM flags five factors: starting point, stakeholder structure, investment beliefs, team size and degree of internalization, and regulatory context.
Fully integrated models tend to appear at smaller, less heavily regulated funds that outsource more, the report says, while very large funds with deep internal expertise more often adopt partially integrated structures.
