Drumbeats: Canadian Indigenous Investment Podcast

OMERS President and Chief Executive Officer Blake Hutcheson on Canadian capital deployment, Indigenous equity structures, and the pricing case for major project debt.

Recorded in front of a live audience at the First Nations Major Projects Coalition's annual event in late April.

Blake Hutcheson, President and Chief Executive Officer of OMERS, has put a clear number on the page for international investors. At least $10 billion of additional Canadian deployment over the next five years, with a stated intention to lift Canada's share of the portfolio meaningfully above its current 20%. OMERS is one of Canada's Maple 8, managing approximately $155 billion in equity for 665,000 Ontarians, with a global portfolio operating across 14 time zones.

In this conversation with Mark Magnacca and Rob Brant, Hutcheson sets out:

Why OMERS is finding Canada more investable than it has been in recent decades How the Bruce Power isotopes joint venture financing was priced at levels comparable to Government of Canada and Government of Ontario notes, and why this matters as a prototype for Indigenous-partnered infrastructure debt The $90 billion annual delta between current Canadian defence spend and the 2035 NATO target, and why the move from 70% foreign procurement to 70% domestic creates an addressable opportunity set across industrials and infrastructure Why First Nations are no longer accepting one-off cheques and are demanding equity positions in the businesses operating on their territories The competitive gap with the United States on corporate tax, depreciation rules, and treaty arrangements Hutcheson runs OMERS on a fiduciary mandate that he describes plainly. "If we're playing jump ball with opportunities in England or Australia or the US or Canada, we really do try to weight more heavily for Canada, but not because we're being nice about it." The math has to work first.

For UK and continental European Managing Directors in Leveraged Finance, Debt Capital Markets, Infrastructure Finance, and Industrials coverage, this is a direct read on capital allocation thinking from inside the Maple 8. 

For forty years, Kitsaki Management Limited Partnership built one of Canada's largest Indigenous enterprise groups without external debt or outside equity.

Kitsaki now operates 12 companies and 21 subsidiaries, employs over 2,000 people, and has distributed $47 million back to the 12,900 members of the Lac La Ronge Indian Band. In this episode of Drumbeats, hosts Mark Magnacca and Rob Brant speak with CEO Ron Hyggen about how Kitsaki reached this scale across Saskatchewan's uranium and potash sectors, and why it is now opening to external capital for the first time in its history.

You'll learn:

• How Kitsaki built a full-service platform working with Cameco, Orano, Nutrien, Mosaic, and BHP

• A governance model that keeps chief and council in the boardroom under director-level fiduciary duties

• Why Kitsaki is now borrowing externally and exploring equity participation in Canada's critical minerals strategy

• What any prospective partner needs to bring: alignment with the nation's interests, willingness to negotiate rather than dictate, and a long-term orientation

Forty years of self-funded growth. Now ready to talk to outside capital, on its own terms.

 Adam Matthews is the Chief Responsible Investment Officer at the Church of England Pensions Board. He plays a key role in how major institutional investors assess mining companies and evaluate Canada’s Indigenous equity partnership model as part of how they allocate capital.

He also chairs the Global Investor Commission on Mining 2030, a coalition of 125 institutional investors managing about $19 trillion in assets, working to define how responsible investment in mining is properly applied and to translate those standards into investment practice.

In this episode of Drumbeats, Adam Matthews explains how institutional investors are building and applying risk and governance frameworks that shape responsible investment in mining, and how those frameworks are increasingly used to assess Indigenous partnership structures in Canada.

In this conversation, you'll learn: 

• Why mining matters more to the global economy than what most investment portfolios show • What the Global Investor Commission on Mining 2030 is doing to reshape standards for responsible mining

• The difference between real Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) and simple box-ticking compliance, and how investors tell them apart

• How a new Investor Mining Performance Framework is being built to link Indigenous rights and mining standards to how investments are assessed • Why Canada’s Indigenous equity partnership model is getting more attention from large global investors

• How global politics against ESG are affecting long-term investment strategies in the UK and Europe

This is why Canada’s Indigenous equity partnership model is gaining attention from global investors. It is being recognised as a practical benchmark for responsible mining, and is increasingly being built into the frameworks that shape how institutional capital evaluates mining projects. 

Nearly two hundred investors, lenders, and project principals gathered at the London Stock Exchange for the third annual Canadian Indigenous Investment Summit — and nobody left the sessions. One of Canada's Maple Eight pension funds noted that the corridors were empty all day: a small detail, and a precise one.

In this post-summit debrief, Drumbeats hosts Mark Magnacca and Rob Brant go through what the room revealed — the conversations that moved furthest and the intelligence that matters for institutional capital with an interest in Canada.

On energy: A major LNG project in northwest British Columbia is approaching a final investment decision. The Indigenous nation involved holds a fifty-fifty equity stake. The key insight from the session was not the project's scale. It was that the Indigenous partner has been actively lobbying the Canadian government to advance the project — not delay it. Production is targeted for around 2030.

On institutional capital: A major European asset manager moderated the infrastructure debt panel. The First Nations Finance Authority recently completed a bond financing of half a billion dollars, drawing institutional demand from investors outside Canada.

On governance: A fireside conversation explored a governance model that has built over one hundred and eighty million dollars in consolidated assets across multiple sectors over forty-four years — and what institutional due diligence should be asking about it.

On defence and the circumpolar frontier: The Canada-UK Defence and Resilience Partnership, announced in the days before the summit, shifted the weight of the Arctic Security Corridor session considerably. Canada has committed thirty billion dollars to northern defence and infrastructure. The government has set a minimum of five per cent of procurement with Indigenous partners — and Indigenous-owned enterprises have been positioning for this moment.

Summit 2027 returns to the Square Mile in April. Subscribe to Drumbeats to follow the conversations that began in that room. 

The old investment rules are no longer enough to protect capital in this new market with greater macro volatility.

With the oil crisis ongoing, the global economy continues to face rising pressure and uncertainty. Crude prices have soared up to $112 per barrel. European gas surged more than 70% in March, and TTF, the European gas benchmark, traded at €54 per megawatt-hour.

Even gold and government bonds, which investors usually trust in tough times, are no longer providing the stability they once did.

Where can investors safely put their money?

In this pre-summit episode of Drumbeats, just a few days before the 2026 Canadian Indigenous Investment Summit at the London Stock Exchange, hosts Mark Magnacca and Rob Brant discuss what’s changed, what matters, and why Canadian Indigenous partnerships are becoming viable solutions for long-term, stable investment opportunities.

If you’re an investor, asset manager, or involved in any large-scale infrastructure or resource projects, this episode is a clear preview of where to find sustainable capital opportunities.

As global capital markets shift, Canada is emerging as a stronger solution.

In April 2025, the Premiers of Manitoba and Nunavut signed a joint declaration to create a strategic energy and economic corridor between the two jurisdictions. Manitoba repatriated expiring hydro export contracts to the US and carved out 50 megawatts specifically for the Kivalliq Hydro-Fibre Link. 

As Anne-Raphaëlle Audouin, CEO of Nukik Corporation, explains in this episode: until that moment, the project had a concept but no product to flow through the transmission line. That declaration changed everything.

In Part 2 of this two-episode conversation, Anne-Raphaëlle takes Mark Magnacca and Rob Brant inside the project itself - its full specification, its commercial architecture, and the one remaining obstacle between concept and construction.

The Kivalliq Hydro-Fibre Link is a 1,200-kilometre dual-use transmission and fibre optic asset running from Churchill in northern Manitoba to five of the Kivalliq region's seven communities.

Its anchor customer is Agnico Eagle Mines which Anne-Raphaelle describes as the largest Canadian gold miner and the second-largest gold miner in the world with two operating mines in the region for close to 20 years. Mining represents 75% of Nunavut's GDP. That anchor customer's long-term energy requirements are the bankable revenue that makes private capital participation viable.

In this second episode, Mark Magnacca, Rob Brant and Anne-Raphaëlle cover:
◦ Why the April 2025 joint declaration was the project's defining commercial turning point, triggering MISO certification, the transmission service request to Manitoba Hydro, and commercial agreements with Qulliq Energy Corporation.
◦ The capital structure: Canada Infrastructure Bank leading the financial workstream, senior debt market sounding currently under way, and why the federal backstop is the piece that has not yet moved.
◦ The chicken-and-egg financing dynamic and why the federal government is a key enabler.
◦ The Greenland benchmark: no engineering reason separates what Greenland has built from what Nunavut could achieve, the gap is political.
◦ The defence and Arctic sovereignty dimension, and what Canada's growing national defence budget means for projects of this kind.

Commercial close is targeted for 2026 or early 2027. 

The financial investment decision follows in 2028, with construction starting by the end of that year.

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Nunavut is 20% of Canada's landmass. It has no roads, no transmission lines and no physical connection to the rest of the nation. Every watt of electricity powering its homes, hospitals, schools and two major gold mines runs on diesel and almost all of that diesel is imported from foreign countries. Anne-Raphaëlle Audouin, CEO of Nukik Corporation, is working to change that.

In this episode of Drumbeats, Anne-Raphaëlle explains the scope of the challenge, the commercial architecture of the solution, and why she believes Canada's Arctic represents one of the most compelling regulated infrastructure opportunities available to institutional investors today.

Nukik Corporation was established in 2021 by the Kivalliq Inuit Association, making it 100% Inuit-owned. Its flagship project - the Kivalliq Hydro-Fibre Linkis a $3 billion, 1,000-kilometre transmission line that would connect the Kivalliq region's communities, government and mining operations to the continental grid for the first time. Anne-Raphaëlle joined as CEO in 2022, bringing a career spanning environmental law, natural resources management and over a decade in the hydropower sector across Canada and West Africa.

In this first part of a two-episode conversation, Mark Magnacca, Rob Brant and Anne-Raphaëlle cover:
• Why Nunavut's 25 communities were settled artificially during Canada's Arctic colonisation in the 1950s and 1960s, and how that history shapes the infrastructure deficit today
• The energy sovereignty risk: 138 million litres of foreign diesel imported annually, with telecommunications dependent on non-Canadian Starlink technology
• Nukik's landmark MISO certification making it the first and only Arctic electricity developer accredited by a US regional transmission organisation  and what that milestone means for project bankability
• Mark Carney's Major Projects Office and why Nukik meets all five national interest criteria, yet commercial close remains contingent on federal commitment
• Why Inuit communities are pushing Nukik to build faster, and why that represents a rare and valuable social license for infrastructure investors

For UK and continental European institutional investors, the strategic parallels are direct: regulated transmission infrastructure, sovereign-backed energy security imperatives, and anchor customers in the form of major mining operations with long-term energy contracts. The project is commercially advanced. The question, as Anne-Raphaëlle puts it plainly, is who blinks first.

Click here for audio version

For institutional investors, infrastructure fund managers, and senior advisors evaluating Canadian project opportunities, the question is no longer whether Indigenous equity participation matters - it is how the financing actually works, and what the federal government is doing to accelerate it. This episode answers both questions directly.

In Part 2 of our conversation with Jonathan Davey, Managing Director of Indigenous and Government Advisory at Scotiabank's Global Banking and Markets division, we move from the biographical to the operational. Jonathan is Haudenosaunee and a member of the Lower Cayuga Nation of the Six Nations of the Grand River. He brings a decade of Indigenous law practice, five years building Scotiabank's Indigenous financial services group, two years in the office of Scotiabank's President and CEO to a conversation that covers the full mechanics of Indigenous project finance in Canada today.

In Part 2, Jonathan covers:
• Section 89 of the Indian Act - why this single provision has historically been the greatest barrier to capital access for Indigenous communities, and the leasehold financing structures and investment vehicles practitioners use to navigate it

• Concessionary capital - what it is, where it comes from, and how forthcoming amendments to the First Nations Fiscal Management Act will allow the First Nations Finance Authority to provide low-cost capital directly to Indigenous special purpose vehicles for the first time

• Canada's $10 billion Indigenous Loan Guarantee Corporation - how federal and provincial loan guarantee programmes are bringing institutional lender risk weights close to zero on qualifying transactions, and what that means for the cost of capital on major projects

• The Build Canada Act and Major Projects Office - why every project of national interest now requires Indigenous participation, what the federal permit designation programme means for project timelines, and why Jonathan describes the current moment as a massive sea change

• The investment case for partnering with Indigenous groups - beyond the financial incentives, why Jonathan argues that Indigenous business acumen, stewardship, and traditional knowledge make these partnerships operationally compelling, not just politically necessary

• What has genuinely changed in Canada - a direct answer to the question sceptical international investors are asking, from someone who has watched the shift from inside one of Canada's largest banks

The key message for UK and European investors: the structures, programmes, and federal commitment that make Indigenous equity participation in major Canadian projects financially compelling are live now. The practitioners exist, the capital is available, and the deal flow in Jonathan's own words is unlike anything he has seen before.

For senior investment bankers, infrastructure fund managers, and institutional investors building a picture of Canada's Indigenous economy, understanding who is driving change inside the country's major financial institutions matters as much as understanding policy. This episode gives you direct access to one of those people.

Jonathan Davey is Managing Director of Indigenous and Government Advisory at Scotiabank's Global Banking and Markets division- the first role of its kind at a major Canadian bank. Haudenosaunee and a member of the Lower Cayuga Nation of the Six Nations of the Grand River, Jonathan spent a decade practising Indigenous law at Canada's Department of Justice before Scotiabank asked him to help build their Indigenous financial services practice. Most recently he spent a year working directly in the office of Scotiabank's President and CEO Scott Thompson before stepping into his current role.

In Part 1 of this conversation, Jonathan covers:

• His path from Indigenous law to capital markets - why he left the Department of Justice after a decade, what Scotiabank's pitch actually was, and how a mutual investment between banker and institution built something genuinely new
• What it means to work for the Crown as an Indigenous person - Jonathan speaks candidly about the weight of representing a federal government whose decisions have historically been injurious to his community, and why moving to the private sector gave him more room to create change
• A year in the office of Scotiabank's CEO - what Jonathan observed about leadership at the highest level of a major Canadian financial institution, and how Scott Thompson's approach to Indigenous relationships shaped the bank's direction
• Cedar Leaf Capital - how client demand from a single procurement-focused corporate client led Scotiabank to help establish Canada's first Indigenous-owned broker dealer, and why Jonathan considers it one of the bank's proudest achievements
• The collegiality driving Canada's Indigenous finance ecosystem- why practitioners across competing institutions, law firms, and advisory businesses are actively supporting each other's success

The key message for UK and European investors: the infrastructure of Indigenous participation in Canadian capital markets is being built right now, from the inside, by people like Jonathan Davey. This episode introduces you to how that happened and who is doing it.

Canada has a housing crisis in its Indigenous communities that has run for fifty years. The federal government's social housing programme - capped at $150 million annually - produces fewer than one home per community per year across 630 First Nations. The major banks, operating on policies written in the 1960s, have largely refused to lend on-reserve. And yet the infrastructure, the legal frameworks, and the investor appetite to solve this problem exist today.

Tracee Smith, President and CEO of Keewaywin Capital Inc., is the private credit fund manager who is stepping into that gap and building a compelling investment case in the process.

A Missinaibi Cree entrepreneur, former Bay Street lender, and founder of the nationally recognised Outside Looking In youth charity, Tracee brings a rare combination of community credibility and institutional financial fluency to an underserved market. Keewaywin's model is methodical: advance construction capital to First Nations communities, partner with CMHC's Section 95 social housing programme as a near-guaranteed takeout mechanism, and deploy funds at the point where traditional lenders refuse to go - the design-to-completion construction phase.

In this episode, Rob Brant speaks with Tracee about:

• Why Canada's major banks have structurally failed on-reserve communities - and why that represents a private credit opportunity
• How Keewaywin's partnership with CMHC provides investors with a near-sovereign-backed repayment structure
• The fund's first major deployment: a $25 million deal in Manitoba delivering 30 modular homes and infrastructure for 200 units
• Why UK and European pension capital is beginning to look seriously at Indigenous private credit funds
• The systemic policy failures - from siloed government programmes to discriminatory lending practices - that make private capital essential

For UK and continental European institutional investors, Keewaywin represents something increasingly rare: a private credit fund with quantifiable social impact, a defined security structure, and access to a Canadian market that remains almost entirely overlooked by international capital.

Canada Indigenous business growth, oil sands investment opportunities, and Truth and Reconciliation economic impact explained by Nicole Bourque, CEO of Bouchier Group.

UK and European investors gain insight into how a $200M Indigenous-owned industrial company is scaling, winning ExxonMobil recognition, and building institutional-grade growth platforms.

Part 2 explores how Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission became an unexpected catalyst for Indigenous business competitiveness, unlocking new commercial pathways for Indigenous-owned companies operating at scale. In this continuation of our conversation, Nicole discusses Bouchier's transformation:

• Nicole explains how Bouchier Group integrated Indigenous identity with operational excellence.

• Nicole reveals why her company achieved 25% growth in peak years and why she's now deliberately slowing to 5% growth at the $200 million threshold to explore diversification beyond oil sands.

• What international investors misunderstand about Indigenous partnerships in Canada’s resource economy.

An Indigenous female CEO whose company proves Indigenous-led businesses succeed on merit, alliances, and good partnerships.

ABOUT NICOLE BOURQUE: Nicole Bourque serves as CEO and Co-owner of The Bouchier Group, one of Canada's largest Indigenous-owned companies with $200+ million annual revenues, 1,400 employees from nearly 100 First Nations, and major contracts with CNRL, Imperial Oil, Suncor Energy. Recent recognition: December 2024 Member of the Order of Canada, December 2024 ExxonMobil International Diverse Supplier Award

CHAPTERS

00:00 - Why UK and European investors are re-evaluating Indigenous partnerships in Canada

00:13 - Scaling a $200M Indigenous-owned industrial services company in Canada’s oil sands

00:45 - Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission as a catalyst for institutional investment

01:48 - Indigenous culture, ESG, and operating in Canada’s energy and infrastructure sectors

04:50 - Competing on commercial merit: Indigenous enterprises and global capital expectations

08:53 - ExxonMobil’s global supplier award and what it signals to international investors

10:39 - Diversification beyond Alberta: national expansion and infrastructure opportunities

12:29 - Governance, systems, and capital discipline to scale from $200M to $400M

19:03 - What UK and European investors misunderstand about Indigenous partnerships

20:15 - Lessons from a UK minority investment partnership and institutional governance

30:43 - How international investors should engage Indigenous communities in Canada

33:45 - Relationship-led capitalism as Canada’s strategic advantage in global markets

In this first part of our conversation, Nicole Bourque-Bouchier walks through a story that starts with checking her company's first year-end financials on her honeymoon. After the hardest working year of her life, she scrolled to the bottom line: minus $250,000.

That was 2005. Bouchier just closed 2025 at $200 million.

Nicole is CEO of Bouchier, one of Canada's largest privately-owned Indigenous companies in Alberta's oil sands. She's Mikisew Cree, raised on the trapline before her father took a Syncrude job and moved the family to Fort McMurray. She worked through Syncrude, ran her own consulting business, then joined Shell - where she met David, who had a small contracting operation on the side.

In 2004, they both quit their corporate jobs and went all in. Nicole admits she \"didn't know what a dozer or excavator was\" when she started. Everything about running this business, she taught herself.

In this episode, Nicole explains:

$250,000 first-year loss to $200 million, what financial discipline actually looks like

Fort McKay First Nation, Finning Canada, Alberta Treasury Branch extended payment terms - still partners decades later

28-year relationships with CNRL, Suncor, Imperial Oil, how partnership economics drives client retention

Self-taught CEO scaling three divisions with zero business training

99 Indigenous communities, 39% Indigenous workforce, 41% Indigenous leadership

Seven Sacred Teachings in daily operations - values as performance framework

$12 million community investment, zero-default performance record

In December 2024, Nicole received the Order of Canada and ExxonMobil's International Diverse Supplier Award - validation that relationship-based Indigenous business models deliver sustained client retention and performance through cycles.

ABOUT NICOLE BOURQUE-BOUCHIER: Nicole Bourque-Bouchier serves as CEO and Co-owner of Bouchier, one of Canada's largest Indigenous-owned companies with $200+ million annual revenues, 1,400 employees from nearly 100 First Nations, and major contracts with CNRL, Imperial Oil, Suncor Energy. Recent recognition: December 2024 Member of the Order of Canada, December 2024 ExxonMobil International Diverse Supplier Award

CHAPTERS

00:00 - Why Indigenous partnerships are central to Canadian natural resource and infrastructure investment

00:12 - Building one of Canada’s largest Indigenous-owned companies in the oil sands

00:51 - Global recognition: Order of Canada and ExxonMobil’s international supplier award

02:49 - Understanding Canada’s oil sands geography for UK and European investors

03:17 - Indigenous land stewardship, traditional economies, and modern resource development

07:48 - Education, oil sands entry, and early engagement between industry and First Nations

10:32 - From side business to full commitment: entrepreneurial risk in capital-intensive sectors

12:21 - Winter roads, exploration logistics, and how oil sands projects are actually built

14:25 - Long-term contracts, zero-default performance, and operational credibility

17:03 - Scaling to $200M revenue with Indigenous leadership and workforce participation

18:59 - First-year losses, capital discipline, and financial resilience

21:04 - Governance lessons every entrepreneur and investor must learn early

23:10 - Strategic partners, banks, and suppliers who enable Indigenous enterprise growth

25:35 - Expansion beyond oil sands: facility maintenance, infrastructure, and national growth

27:21 - Embedding Indigenous values into corporate culture and operational performance