For BMO, the 13 new hires are the latest additions to the more than 50 investment professionals the bank’s asset management division has hired in recent months.Chris Wattie/Reuters
Bank of Montreal’s BMO-T asset management business has landed more than a dozen portfolio managers and equity analysts from CI Financial Corp., CIX-T, as the bank continues to aggressively hire for its Canadian operation following the sale of its European asset manager. last year.
On Monday, BMO Global Asset Management announced the addition of a new global equity team consisting of 13 experienced investment professionals covering a broad range of global sectors including healthcare, technology, energy and resources , finance and industry. The jump of such a large number of managers at once is a rare move in the industry.
Prior to joining BMO, the 13 individuals worked in partnership at CI Global Asset Management, a division of one of the nation’s largest independent investment managers, CI Financial. Many of them had worked together for more than 10 to 20 years at CI, including prominent portfolio managers Malcolm White, John Hadwen, Jeff Elliott, Massimo Bonansinga and Jeremy Yeung.
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CI spokesman Murray Oxby confirmed in an email that Mr. White, Mr. Hadwen and Mr. Elliott no longer work at CI. The managers, he said, oversaw less than one percent of CI’s assets, and the exits were communicated to clients about four months ago. CI declined to comment on any other employee departures, but confirmed that the company has not had any refunds as a result of the changes.
For BMO, the 13 new hires are the latest additions to the more than 50 investment professionals the bank’s asset management division has hired in recent months. The asset manager plans to focus its attention on North America, particularly Canada, where the bank hopes to focus more resources on business lines where it has better prospects for strong returns.
Last year, the bank sold its European underperforming asset management business for $1.1 billion to Ameriprise Financial Inc. The deal was part of CEO Darryl White’s plan to reduce BMO’s non-core business portfolio and boost the bank’s efficiency ratio, a metric. BMO investors look closely at how it measures expenses relative to revenue: 64 basis points (100 basis points equals one percentage point).
“We made some pretty big strategic decisions in terms of our asset management business in Europe and the US and they were really intentional moves designed to allow us to focus on the areas where we had scale and a strong competitive advantage “, BMO Global Asset. The directorate’s executive director, Kristi Mitchem, said in an interview with The Globe and Mail.
“We have made it known to the market that we are interested in expanding and growing in Canada and that we believe in the strength of our Canadian franchise. That’s attractive to a lot of people, both investors and distribution staff and product staff.”
BMO GAM chief investment officer Sadiq Adatia said Mitchem’s vision to deepen the Canadian market was one of the reasons he decided to join the bank last year. Before his transfer, Mr. Adatia was the chief investment officer of the asset management division of Sun Life Financials.
Now, as he passes the one-year mark with BMO, Mr. Adatia says the bank will continue to look to expand the global equity side of the business. While he did not comment specifically on how the bank recruited the 13 people, Mr. Adatia said his previous role allowed him to spend a lot of time with “many” fund managers in the country.
BMO’s recent hires, he says, will help expand the bank’s internal capabilities in key areas it wants to grow, including equities, bonds, quantitative investing, responsible investing, exchange-traded funds and alternatives.
“Strong investment professionals attract the attention of other strong investment professionals,” said Mr. Adatia “These experienced professionals have a track record of strong performance in the global equity space, success in growing assets and $20 billion of assets under management collectively.”
With more than $320 billion in assets under management, BMO GAM aims to double its earnings by 2024, a goal that was set when Ms. Mitchem joined the company in 2019.
To do this, two main areas of focus for Ms. Mitchem are to expand the market share of the bank’s mutual fund franchise against its competitors – the other big Canadian banks – and continue to boost the bank’s exchange-traded fund business, which currently has about $74 billion in assets
Both investment areas will benefit from the shift to active management by many investors in the current market environment, says Mr. Adatia
“This is a really strong environment now for active management and a key part of why we’re bringing in all these investment professionals,” he adds. “We’ve been through a period where passive investing made a lot of sense, but we’re in an environment with high inflation, high interest rates, potential pressure on earnings and housing.
“So that’s where active management should play it and clients are looking for ways to offset higher inflation and get better returns.”
Other investment professionals joining BMO Global Asset Management on Monday include Hoa Hong, Goshen Benzaquen, Kyle Mendyk, Janice Wong, Alex Yang, Alexander Payne, Shawna McIntee and Edward Durrant-Taylor.
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