Canadian Pension Vet Joins NZ Super | Chief Investment Officer

DougPearce Doug Pearce (Art by Chris Buzelli)The New Zealand Superannuation Fund has appointed veteran Canadian asset owner Doug Pearce to its board of guardians, the fund announced Wednesday.

Pearce led the British Columbia Investment Management Corporation (BCIMC) as founding CEO and CIO for 25 years. He retired in 2014, succeeded by Quebec pension chief Gordon Fyfe. BCIMC grew from a small portfolio of Canadian government bonds in 1988 to a diversified $114 billion during Pearce’s tenure.

He takes this experience to NZ Super—another early-stage sovereign fund—noted board Chair Catherine Savage in the announcement.

The NZ$30 billion (US$20 billion) fund praised Pearce as a “proponent of good governance and responsible investment,” sustainability being a key priority of both NZ Super and BCIMC.

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Pearce joins the board along with another retired executive: John Williamson, an ex-managing director of Australian portfolio company Hellaby Holdings.

“We look forward to working with them,” Savage said.

NZ Super has brought overseas investment expertise to its board while dropping it from the portfolio. In May, the fund revealed it had cut ties with nearly all mainstream foreign private equity and real estate firms.

“The move to sell them is consistent with our strategy to have fewer, deeper relationships with our investment managers,” said Fiona Mackenzie, head of investments, at the time.

Bill Marshall_NISA Bill Marshall, Director of DC Product Strategy & ImplementationNISA Investment Advisors has invested in more talent for developing defined contribution (DC)-specific income products, CIO has learned.

The firm hired Bill Marshall from AllianceBernstein as director of DC product strategy and implementation. Marshall joined the St. Louis, Missouri-based manager last month, according to his LinkedIn.

“NISA is committed to the defined contribution market and Bill’s hire is another important step for us in bringing default solutions to DC that are focused on managing retirement risks for participants and plan sponsors alike,” David Eichhorn, NISA’s managing director of investment strategies, told CIO.

Marshall is a visionary and a target-date fund veteran, Eichhorn continued, and will help NISA develop its house view on securing retirement income. This includes building out the product’s platform and system, he said.

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NISA’s first DC hire Mark Fortier worked at AllianceBernstein alongside Marshall on United Technologies’ annuity-like option.

Marshall also spent time at Allstate Financial where he created a target-date fund series “with innovative guaranteed income option using deferred annuities”—a first in the market, according to his LinkedIn.

NISA, a liability-driven investing expert, first jumped into DC last year, hiring Fortier also to lead income products.

“We are intellectually curious people,” CEO Jess Yawitz told CIO in March 2015.

“But while we have often explored different product ideas, NISA has rarely acted upon any of those musings,” Yawitz continued. “It goes without saying that the recent investments we have made in people and resources in the custom target-date fund space signifies our commitment to delivering the innovative, yet practical solutions for clients.”