AXA Investment Managers made four senior hires for its liquid absolute-return team, AXA IM Chorus, said a spokeswoman for the firm.
Jerome Brochard and Hector Chan joined as co-chief investment officers. Mr. Brochard was a managing director in Goldman Sachs’ equities division, where he led the systematic trading strategies team, said a news release from AXA. Mr. Chan was a managing director and head of Asia-Pacific fixed income, currency and commodities structuring, also at Goldman Sachs, the news release said.
Augustin Landier joined as head of research. He is a visiting professor of finance at Harvard Business School, a role he will retain along with the AXA IM position.
Ahcene Gareche is a senior quant researcher in the team. He joined from hedge fund Marshall Wace where he was a quantitative researcher. A spokesman for Marshall Wace was unavailable.
All positions are new. The AXA IM Chorus team, which is based in Hong Kong and now has 16 professionals, was created under the leadership of Pierre-Emmanuel Juillard, managing director, who joined the firm in April.
The new team is fully integrated with the rest of the €679 billion ($757.4 billion) money manager and will focus on liquid absolute-return strategies. The team plans to create a diversified portfolio with low correlation to traditional asset classes, by combining different risk premiums.
Subject to regulatory approval, the team aims to market liquid absolute-return strategies to clients starting next year.
“While absolute-return strategies are not new, we see demand for them increasing and believe that our approach, powered by a team of some of the brightest and best from the buy and sell side, as well as research and technology, will offer clients an exciting and differentiated proposition,” Mr. Juillard said in the release.
