AP3, one of the big four buffer funds behind Sweden’s state pension, has invested around $500m (€422m) via its American forestry unit Three Tree Holding in about 300,000 acres of timberland in eastern Texas.

The pension fund said the asset had been acquired from TexMark Timber Treasury (Triple T), a joint venture managed by the NYSE-listed CatchMark Timber Trust.

Dan Bergman, head of ILS [insurance-linked securities] and timberland investments at the Stockholm-based pension fund, said: “This investment is part of AP3s strategy to build a sustainable and robust portfolio - a portfolio that can deliver good returns also under negative climate scenarios.”

AP3 said Three Tree, a wholly-owned subsidiary, managed and invested sustainably for the long term in North American timberland assets.

CatchMark Timber Trust had announced that Triple T had completed the sale of the 300,000 acres to an unnamed client of Hancock Natural Resource Group.

CatchMark - which acts as the asset manager and general partner of the Triple T joint venture on behalf of a consortium of institutional investors - said the property sold represented a portion of the 1.1m acres in east Texas that Triple T owned.

Bergman said AP3 saw great potential in its strategic collaboration with Hancock Natural Resource Group. “It will enable us to contribute more to the long-term supply of sustainable forestry products,” he said.

At the end of 2020, AP3 had 1.4% of its SEK423bn (€41.5bn) portfolio invested in forestry assets, according to its annual report.

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