(February 25, 2013) — Goldman Sachs Asset Management’s (GSAM) senior team has suffered another departure, less than one month after Chairman Jim O’Neill announced his retirement from the bank-run investment arm.
Paul Trickett is to step down from his role leading the company’s Global Portfolio Solutions group in EMEA, Financial News reported this morning. A spokesperson from GSAM in London, where Trickett was based, confirmed the move to aiCIO, and said Trickett is leaving for personal reasons. He decided to retire from his career as a full-time executive before O’Neill announced his own departure, the spokesperson said.
Jim O’Neill, the economist credited with creating the acronym BRICs, relating to the fastest-growing emerging markets of the time, Brazil, Russia, India, and China, announced his retirement from the bank on February 5.
Trickett joined the asset manager in October 2010 after spending 12 years in the higher echelons of investment consultant Towers Watson, and previously Watson Wyatt before its merger with Towers Perrin.
Before moving to the consulting firm, Trickett had been CEO of the British Coal Pension Scheme, one of the largest pension schemes in the UK.
In 1996, this pension fund acted as a springboard for Goldman Sachs to launch its asset management offering into Europe. When British Coal was privatised in the 1990s – it had previously been a state-owned industry – Goldman Sachs bought the rights to manage 80% of its then £20 billion pension scheme. The deal allowed the bank to run money through a balanced portfolio for a six-year term. The contract was substantially cut back in 2009, while GSAM retained responsibility for a much smaller part of a more diversified portfolio.