You’re hired! The 10 biggest job moves in February
Citywire Americas counts down the most read fund manager and selector moves over the past month.
10. T.Rowe snaps up Henderson HY fund and hires PM
Kicking off the list of the biggest moves in the investment world in Feburary, we have Baltimore-based T. Rowe Price announcing its plans to acquire the Henderson High Yield Opportunities fund as well as its lead portfolio manager Citywire AA-rated Kevin Loome .
The Henderson fund will be reorganized into the not-yet-launched T. Rowe Price US High Yield fund in the US, which will assume its $61.7 million of assets and performance track record.
While the deal relates to the US-domiciled fund, Loome was most recently the lead portfolio manager on the Henderson Global High Yield Bond fund, which is a Ucits product.
Henderson has continued to see senior investment staff exit ahead of its merger with US investment firm Janus Capital.
9. Santander Chile PM and head of balanced funds exits
Fund manager Roberto Paut left Santander Asset Management Chile after six years with the firm. The Santiago-based manager had been with the firm since 2011 and was its head of strategy and balanced funds.
Paut ran over half a dozen Chilean-domiciled funds that were invested across a variety of sectors. All but one will be run by his co-manager Tom Caddick.
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8. UBS Americas names new manager research head
UBS Wealth Management Americas ended its search for a head of investment manager research, appointing internal candidate Joseph Aniano to the role, Citywire revealed last week.
Aniano has been with UBS since 2007 and most recently held the position of senior research product manager. He also had experience working on the offshore side as asenior sales officer.
In his new role, he will oversee a collection of analysts, who are responsible for researching and recommending long-only mutual funds and separate accounts for UBS advisory, brokerage and institutional consulting platforms across both its domestic and non-resident client businesses.
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7. Credicorp hires former AFP ProVida selector
Former head of equity fund selection at Chilean pension fund AFP ProVida, Alberto Menendez, resurfaced in February, as part of Credicorp Capital’s distribution unit.
Menendez left MetLife-owned AFP ProVida, where he was head of international equity for over three years, in August 2016 and joined Credicorp as manager of institutional distribution for ETF provider State Street in Chile, Peru and Colombia.
A spokeswoman for ProVida confirmed the firm promoted Alvaro Garcia to take on Menendez’s duties.
The firm is also currently in the process of recruiting another analyst to cover international fixed income.
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6. Citi Private Bank equity fund selector exits
Citi Private Bank's Jeffrey Mekulski left the firm a little over a year after joining its equity fund selection team.
Mekulski intiailly joined the group’s Wilmington, Delaware office in November 2015 as a senior research analyst within its manager research and selection team.
At the time Citi confirmed the departure but declined to comment on whether he had been replaced.
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5. IPG hires CIO and recruits teams
Independent RIA and broker-dealer Investment Placement Group (IPG) named a new chief investment officer and brought onboard two more teams in its continued effort to bulk up its business.
The San Diego-based firm, which services both international and domestic clients, hired Todd Crescenzo from San-Diego based investment advisory firm LM Capital Group, where he was a portfolio manager and head of research, as its new CIO.
The team has also welcomed two RIA firms to its broker-dealer business, Aragon Capital in Fort Lauderdale, Florida and Houston-based Crosswell Advisors. Both have clients across US and Latin America and combined manage over $100 million in client assets.
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4. UBS names US offshore operations chief
UBS Americas appointed wealth management director Dave Lubkemann to the newly-created role of chief administrator officer international for its US offshore business.
The 11-year UBS veteran was until recently the head of global investment solutions for its US private banking business and according to a source familiar with the matter, he will now take on the main logistics and operations duties for US offshore.
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3. Investec poaches Pioneer sales manager
Investec Asset Management bolstered its US offshore team with the hire of former Pioneer Investment wholesaler Michelle Trilli, in the third biggest move of the month.
Trilli’s hire follows the exit from US offshore Investec sales director Tom Evans in January to lead OppenheimerFunds' US offshore push, as well as the departure of Pioneer's head of sales for US offshore, Jimmy Ly to Dutch asset manager Robeco.
Trilli started her role as sales director on Friday, March 3 to cover the Northeast and Canada for Investec's US offshore business.
To complete Investec’s US offshore team, the firm also promoted product manager Fernando Penaloza to cover the Southwest and California regions, while Mayra Cruz continues to look after Florida and the Caribbean.
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2. Merrill Lynch’s international fund selection shuffle
The second biggest move was actually a more subtle change within Bank of America Merrill Lynch’s product management team.
Citywire revealed it would not be replacing former offshore fund selector Mike Acker, instead distributing his responsibilities across a team led by head of global funds Frank McDonnell.
About a year prior to his departure Merrill Lynch merged offshore fund selection with its domestic counterpart.
The seven product managers will now absorb Acker’s responsibilities, including senior product manager Matt Pusak, who covered offshore funds alongside Acker.
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1. Actinver hires veteran team for Miami launch
The biggest and most read job move in February was the news that Actinver’s US-registered broker-dealer launched a branch in Miami.
The office was formed by Rafael Madan (pictured), Osmundo Martinez and Ludwing Rivera, all formerly with Credit Andorra’s Miami wealth firm Beta Capital Wealth Management with the intention to expand its client base beyond Mexico.
Currently, Actinver Securities has two offices in Texas, San Antonio and Houston, and mainly services Mexican clients due to its private banking presence across the border.
The trio has been working out of a temporary office in Coral Gables since launching in early January, but is looking to expand by adding more advisors and forming a ‘boutique’ that caters to a broader Latin American client book.
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