The Canada Pension Plan fund rose to $152.8 billion in the last quarter of 2011 on improved equity and bond market returns, an increase of $500 million from the $152.3 billion in the fund at the end of the previous quarter.

The fund had $140.1 billion at the end of the same period a year earlier, when its investments were still recovering from recession. That's a 9.1 per cent increase year-over-year.

The CPP Investment Board — which manages the fund that will be used to pay out future pension payments — says it saw $3.2 billion in investment income during the fund's third quarter, on a 2.1 per cent rate of return.

Outflows from the funds were $2.6 billion during the quarter, which ran from October to December of last year.

The CPP fund usually receives more contributions than are required to pay benefits during the first part of the calendar year and then uses a portion of those funds to pay benefits near the end of the year.

The CPPIB is a professional investment management organization that invests surplus contributions on behalf of 18 million Canadian contributors and beneficiaries of the Canada Pension Plan.

With files from the Canadian Press