Carney to showcase Canada’s capital agenda at first national investment summit

Prime Minister Mark Carney will gather major domestic and international investors in Toronto next week for Canada’s first national investment summit, part of an effort to tackle a persistent lack of business investment that has weighed on the economy.

Hundreds of investors managing trillions of dollars in assets are expected at a downtown Toronto hotel on Sept. 14 and 15. Carney, federal cabinet ministers, premiers and Canadian business leaders will bring lists of major projects from across the country.

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said she will market 34 proposed projects. Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe plans to promote the province’s energy, critical minerals, defence and agriculture sectors. New Brunswick Premier Susan Holt said she will advocate for several projects, including a port expansion, a data centre in Lorneville and rehabilitation work on a power plant known as the Mactaquac lifetime achievement project.

The Prime Minister’s Office is co-organizing the event with the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Public Sector Pension Investments, two of Canada’s largest asset managers. The summit reflects the capital-focused agenda Carney outlined 18 months ago when he first took office. Since then, he has shifted federal policy and Ottawa’s budget framework toward critical infrastructure and other major projects.

Carney has set a goal that experts consider ambitious: catalyzing $1 trillion in investment in Canada over five years. Mahmood Nanji, a fellow at Western University’s Ivey School of Business, said Canada’s well-documented business-investment shortage over much of the past decade has contributed to weak productivity and sluggish growth.

Critics often attribute the shortfall to regulatory burdens and the long, uncertain approval process for Canadian projects. A report released Monday by the CPP Investment Board’s Insights arm surveyed 65 of the world’s largest asset managers. It found that energy is Canada’s most attractive investment sector globally, but also carries the sharpest risks, including concerns about policy reversals, fragmented regulation, and scale or liquidity constraints.

The Conservative party has blamed what it calls anti-development laws and charges such as the industrial carbon price for holding back resource extraction and manufacturing. The CPP survey also identified relative Canadian strengths in competition for global capital: Canada performed well on openness to capital and execution of the energy transition, and ranked behind only Singapore on policy stability and predictability. Nearly 70 per cent of investors called predictability extremely important or essential when deciding where to invest.

Jeremy Kronick, president and CEO of the C.D. Howe Institute, said Carney has taken several steps since taking office in March 2025 to signal that Canada is open for business. He cited the major projects office and the One Canadian Economy Act, which aim to streamline approvals for nation-building projects. He said more work remains on issues such as interprovincial trade barriers that can create uncertainty for otherwise viable projects.

Nanji said shifting political opinion could make public support for major projects easier to secure. Angus Reid polling in July indicated broad support for a new pipeline from Alberta to the B.C. coast. But such projects are also frequent litigation targets, and he said officials will need to do more to ensure Indigenous stakeholders support projects before making too many promises to investors.

Statistics Canada reported that foreign direct investment reached $96.8 billion in 2025, its highest level since 2007. BMO chief economist Doug Porter said most of that inflow has so far come through mergers and acquisitions, rather than the greenfield investment that summit organizers hope will help launch new projects.

Porter said the foreign investment figures are particularly encouraging against the backdrop of the Canada-U.S. trade war. He said that, all else being equal, President Donald Trump’s aggressive tariff agenda, which threatens access to the U.S. market, would have been expected to reduce investment inflows. Experts who spoke with The Canadian Press said the recent escalation of the tariff war will be discussed at the summit, but may not prevent deals.

The project list is likely to include ports, pipelines and critical-mineral extraction. Nanji said many opportunities being presented to investors would focus on moving Canadian goods to markets beyond the United States, meaning concerns over the Canada-U.S. relationship may not determine investment decisions.

Speaking to reporters at the Liberal cabinet retreat in Banff on Thursday, Carney said his message to investors would emphasize Canada’s reliability as a supplier in an uncertain world. He said Canada has much more to offer than proximity to the United States and has what the world wants.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2026.