Errico Cocchi

Errico Cocchi is Head of Pension Investments & Debt Financing at the City of Montreal (Ville de Montréal), where he leads the team responsible for recommending, implementing and monitoring the investments of the City's six employee defined-benefit pension plans. Those plans cover roughly 42,500 municipal employees (excluding police) and have been valued in the range of approximately C$9 billion (per a La Financière de l'Échiquier interview) to nearly C$11 billion (per Benefits Canada). He has managed these funds for about 16 years, taking on the role after a career in the private sector.

Since 2014 he has worn a second hat, overseeing the City's debt-issuance (municipal bond) program, which exceeds C$1 billion annually, and is also responsible for managing the organization's surplus cash and sinking fund. A defining feature of his tenure has been building out the alternatives program: he participated in and then led its implementation, growing alternatives from about 8% of plan assets in 2005 to roughly 25% today across multiple strategies within the asset class.

Cocchi began his career as an asset-management consultant with a major Canadian actuarial consulting firm. He holds a Bachelor of Business Administration from Bishop's University and a Master's degree in Economics from the Université de Sherbrooke, and he is a CFA charterholder.

Beyond his City of Montreal role, he has served as a board member and expert member on the investment committee (Comité de Placement) of the Roncalli International Foundation, and he is a recurring speaker at institutional forums such as Benefits Canada's Alternative Investment Conference.

• Operates as an institutional allocator/LP for public pension capital — his "investments" are external managers and funds, not direct startup rounds.
• Prioritizes plan sustainability and cost management, seeking outside expertise in specific asset classes while delegating mandates like equities, bonds and non-North American assets to specialist managers.
• Long-term oriented: in his own words, "We try to avoid what I would call the markets' 'short-termism'."
• Values alignment and durability in manager relationships — he cited a manager's "alignment with our interests and its long-term vision" as key selection factors.
• Heavy emphasis on alternatives/private markets (private equity, private credit, infrastructure, real assets), a book he grew from ~8% to ~25% of plan assets.