Prime Minister Mark Carney unveils $18 billion Canadian investment fund

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TORONTO (AP) — Canada is developing a government-owned investment fund, Prime Minister Mark Carney announced Monday.

Carney said the fund will invest in major Canadian industrial projects in areas such as energy, infrastructure, mining, agriculture and technology. It will begin at 25 billion Canadian dollars ($18 billion).

The prime minister said the federal government will put up funds alongside private investors. The money will help fund projects Carney's government is focused on building as Canada seeks to diversify away from the United States.

U.S. President Donald Trump has been threatening Canada’s economy and sovereignty with tariffs, most offensively by claiming Canada could be “the 51st state.”

Carney is former two-time central banker in England and Canada as well as chair of the board of directors for Bloomberg.

“We take a lesson from other jurisdictions that had the foresight many decades ago to start sovereign wealth funds,” Carney said, “In some cases they began with a domestic focus then outgrew the scale of the domestic focus.”

Sovereign wealth funds invest in assets such as stocks, bonds and real estate. They are typically funded by a country’s budgetary surplus, which Canada currently does not have. The announcement comes a day before the Carney government announces its spring economic update.

There are over 90 sovereign wealth funds around the world that manage over $8 trillion in assets, according to The International Forum of Sovereign Wealth Funds, a London-based organization made up of roughly 50 of these entities.

Trump ordered the creation of U.S. sovereign wealth fund last year. In the U.S., more than 20 sovereign wealth funds exist at the state level, according to an analysis by the Center for Global Development, a Washington-based nonpartisan think tank.