ESG Investor’s weekly round-up of new hires in the sustainable investing sector including HSBC AM, AllianzGI, Jupiter Asset Management, Van Lanschot Kempen, EIRIS Foundation.
HSBC Asset Management has created a new sustainability office and made several senior appointments. Erin Leonard will lead the sustainability office as Global Head of Sustainability, reporting directly to HSBC AM CEO Nicolas Moreau. The sustainability office will be responsible for delivering the asset manager’s sustainability strategy and business-wide transition to sustainable investing. With over 25 years’ experience in asset management, Leonard was most recently Interim Global Head of Institutional Business while leading the firm’s Responsible Investment initiative. “Sustainable investing has become one of the driving forces in our industry. The challenges of delivering on the Paris Agreement and meeting the diverse and fast-changing needs of our clients are immense, but they also offer enormous opportunities for growth. The creation of our Sustainability Office reflects the strategic importance of sustainability to our business and will enable us to be at the leading edge of this change. I’m confident that under Leonard’s leadership, we’ll be able to take our sustainability proposition to the next level, and open up a world of sustainable investment opportunities,” said Moreau. Stuart Kirk has been appointed as Head of Responsible Investment, having previously held the position of Global Head of Research and Insights since he joined HSBC in September 2020. He will start his new role from 12 July and will report to Global CIO Xavier Baraton. HSBC AM will be further expanding its Responsible Investment team with additional hires across stewardship, data and climate change. “Responsible investing underpins all of our investment decisions and I’m delighted to be appointing Stuart to lead our efforts in this important area. Kirk’s experience in managing research teams and on ESG and climate related issues make him ideally placed to lead our Responsible Investment team, continue to raise our standards and champion collaboration and innovation across our investment platform,” said Baraton.
Allianz Global Investors has appointed Marie Navarre as Head of Sustainable Research. In her new role, Navarre will lead a team of six people and develop the firm’s thematic research and ESG-related research. Working closely with the sustainability investment office and the methodologies analytics and stewardship teams, Navarre will report to Mark Wade, Head of Thematic Research and Stewardship at AllianzGI. Navarre has amassed 12 years of experience working in sustainability, previously working in ESG sector analysis at Amundi and IDEAM, the SRI arm of Crédit Agricole Asset Management Group. “Navarre will play an important role in the implementation of the development and roll-out of our new thematic research offering. Her wealth of experience in ESG research will enable us to meet growing client demand and serve our ambition in responsible investing,” said Wade.
Jupiter Asset Management has doubled the size of the team working on its sustainable investing strategies, headed by Abbie Llewellyn-Waters, who was appointed Head of Sustainable Investing as part of a strategy refresh earlier this year. Maiken Anderberg joins the Global Sustainable Equity team as Equity Analyst, working on the Jupiter Global Sustainable Equities strategy. Noelle Guo is appointed Equity Analyst, Environmental Solutions, a newly created role in which she will support fund manager Jon Wallace. Guo has eight years of equity research experience, joining from an Investment Analyst role at Pictet Asset Management. Laura Conigliaro is appointed Analyst, Environmental Solutions, having joined Jupiter in 2019 as a member of its Governance and Sustainability team. Conigliaro will move across to the Environmental Solutions team, with a focus on fixed income verification, also will provide sustainability research into the desk’s environmental impact themes. In an internal move, Jenna Zegleman joins the sustainable investing teams as Investment Director, while Anisha Arora and James Kearns have also joined the Governance and Sustainability team.
Dutch wealth manager Van Lanschot Kempen has appointed CIO Lars Dijkstra to the new role of Chief Sustainability Officer. Reporting directly to the Chairman of the Management Board, Dijkstra will head up the firm’s Sustainability Centre, which coordinates all sustainability activities across Van Lanschot Kempen’s asset management and private banking businesses. Dijkstra has been Van Lanschot Kempen’s Chief Investment Officer since 2005 and has served as head of Core Investment Strategies since the beginning of this year. Erik van Houwelingen, member of the Management Board and Chairman of Kempen Capital Management’s management board, will assume Dijkstra’s current duties. Dijkstra also serves as the Treasurer of Eumedion which represents the interests of institutional investors in corporate governance and sustainability, and is a member of The 300 Club, an international group of investment professionals raising awareness about the impact of current market thinking and behaviours. “Lars’s many years of experience in the financial markets and his extensive knowledge of sustainability and corporate responsibility make him eminently suited to help drive Van Lanschot Kempen’s mission to be a leading sustainable European wealth manager,” said Karl Guha, Chairman of the Management Board.
The EIRIS Foundation, a charity working to increase the impact of responsible investment and business, has appointed four new trustees to its board: Maryann Selfe, Nina Roth, Richard Howitt and Aaron Hay. This follows the increasing demand for investment and business solutions for global environmental and social issues. “Establishing sustainability risks as material factors has taken a long time within the responsible investing space, and there is more work to do for its full recognition and integration across all asset classes. In addition, it’s more than about time to broadly consider salient human rights issues. EIRIS Foundation has done brilliant work through its human rights and conflict work, and I’m excited to contribute as a Trustee going forward,” Roth said. The Foundation aims to expand and develop its work in areas such as human rights, charity support and shaping responsible investment practices. “In my experience in the financial services industry, I have observed that investing sustainably does not necessarily mean giving up on financial returns. Investors can invest for profit and purpose. I am very passionate about helping the EIRIS Foundation drive this movement to channel investments into solving some of the world’s greatest problems while earning a decent return at the same time,” Selfe said.
