More changes at OnePath predicted

OnePath is keeping quiet on industry speculation that further changes to its executive and investment teams could be in the works.

Tuesday, July 10th 2012, 11:09AM

by Niko Kloeten

The fund manager, formerly known as ING NZ before it was bought out by ANZ, has already been through a number of significant personnel changes in the past couple of years.

Former Brook Asset Management owner Simon Botherway, who was instrumental in setting up the FMA, was brought in to ANZ Wealth as general manager, investment management last May. And in November ANZ announced a major shake-up of its investment team, which saw several experienced managers lose their jobs as the company looked to streamline and eliminate duplication between OnePath and ANZ Wealth.

But fund management industry sources suggest there could be more changes in store at OnePath within the next couple of months, as a result of changes rumoured to be planned across the Tasman.

One industry insider told Good Returns, “I’ve heard there’s going to be a restructure happening in the next month or so at ANZ… it’s mostly within Australia although it does affect New Zealand. “It will be interesting to see what happens in New Zealand. They no longer manage money in-house [in Australia]; New Zealand is the only one where that hasn’t been outsourced.”

The source said the recent appointment of Joyce Phillips as ANZ chief executive global wealth and private banking was significant, as it gives the New Zealand investment team “much greater access” to group chief executive Mike Smith (ANZ general manager, wealth John Body reports to Phillips).

“I think one thing they’ve made quite clear is they want to have a regional investment committee that really drives a lot of asset allocation decisions. If I was guessing I would say it could result in fewer people in New Zealand but they’ve already got a fairly lean team.”

OnePath corporate affairs manager Andrew Park said, “We don’t comment on every rumour that’s going around.”

Niko Kloeten can be contacted at niko@goodreturns.co.nz

Tags: OCR