New Hire Roundup: OppenheimerFunds Makes Personnel Changes

John Cogan, who has served as a trustee of the Pioneer Funds continuously for the past 55 years, as president and CEO for the past 50 years, and as chairman of the board of trustees till 2012, has retired as trustee, president and CEO. He has been elected trustee emeritus. Cogan served as president and CEO of the predecessor to Pioneer Investment Management USA Inc., The Pioneer Group, Inc., for 35 years, until 2000. He remained chairman of the U.S. holding company, Pioneer Investment Management USA Inc., until his resignation in November 2013, and also served as deputy chairman of the board of directors of the company’s parent, Pioneer Global Asset Management S.p.A., until 2010. He is a former chairman and managing partner of Bostonlaw firm Hale and Dorr, now known as WilmerHale, and a former chairman of the firm’s corporate department. He joined the firm in 1952 and retired in 1999.

Independent trustee Mark Meyer is a past CEO, director and partner of Grantham, Mayo, Van Otterloo LLC (GMO LLC), an institutional asset manager in Boston. He joined GMO after 20 years at AllianceBernstein LP, and its predecessor, Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. He began at Sanford Bernstein in 1989 as a pharmaceuticals securities analyst and went on to hold numerous advanced positions there. He was also a partner and a member of Sanford Bernstein’s board of directors. Earlier, he worked at the Squibb Corp. for six years. Kenneth Taubes, executive vice president and CIO, U.S., joined the firm in 1998 and is a portfolio manager of four of the firm’s funds as well as of two of its strategies for institutional clients. He also oversees the equity and fixed income portfolio management and research analyst staff in the U.S., is chairman of the U.S. investment committee and a member of the global investment committee. He is also a member of the U.S. management committee. Prior to joining, he spent seven years with Putnam Investments in Boston. He also served as senior vice president and corporate treasurer of Home Owners Savings Bank in Boston, where he worked from 1986 to 1990. He began his career in 1980 with Bank of New England.

BrightScope Welcomes Wallace

BrightScope announced that Joan Wallace, former senior vice president of the GSO customized credit strategies division at the Blackstone Group, has joined the firm as vice president of data solutions. In that role, she will lead the data solutions group, a newly formed department that will serve as the bridge between the sales and client success organizations.

Wallace, who began her career in 1988 at Citigroup, has held senior data-related executive roles at Legg Mason, Allianz, PIMCO, and most recently, Blackstone. Before joining, she accumulated 15 years of IT experience in data warehousing and analytic reporting and more than six years of business strategy experience defining, building and maintaining data solutions to support CRM and sales reporting applications. At the same time she also gained more than 10 years of team management experience spanning both IT and business areas.

Snowden Capital Advisors Adds Two

Snowden Capital Advisors announced that Ray Koch has joined the firm as vice president and controller and Taryn Balthazar has also joined as vice president/operations manager. Koch will be responsible for accounting, financial controls and regulatory reporting. Balthazar will be responsible for operations, field supervision and compliance and administration.

Koch, who spent 24 years at Morgan Stanley and Dean Witter handling investment management financial controls, managed futures and realty accounting, also spent nine years with Thomson McKinnon Securities in capital markets, ultimately as chief administrative officer.

Balthazar was previously a compliance specialist for Wells Fargo Advisors.

New York Life Investments Completes Dexia Acquisition

New York Life Investments has announced the completion of its acquisition of Dexia Asset Management, with management centers in Brussels, Paris, Luxembourg and its investment boutique, Ausbil, based in Sydney.

Naïm Abou-Jaoudé will continue in his role as CEO and chairman of the executive committee of Dexia Asset Management and also joins the executive committee of New York Life Investment Management International as vice chairman. Until the end of 2006, he was a member of Dexia Asset Management’s executive committee, in charge of alternative management and structured products. He joined Dexia Asset Management in 1996. Previously, he was a member of the management board, responsible for the investment management and derivatives department at UBS Asset Management France and Alfi Gestion (companies respectively acquired by Dexia). He started his career as one of the partners at Transoptions Finance, a subsidiary of Crédit Agricole Indosuez.

Paul Xiradis will remain CEO of Ausbil. He was CEO, deputy chairman and founding head of equities at Ausbil Dexia Limited, and co-founded Ausbil in 1997. He started his career in Westpac’s investment management division. Later he became senior portfolio manager for Delfin and investment manager for the Mercantile & General Reinsurance Group inAustraliain 1989. He joined Legal and General Asset Management in 1994, where he became director of Australian equities. In late 1995 he became associate director, equities at BZW Investment Management, a position he held until 1997.

Yie-Hsin Hung, in addition to her current role as co-president of New York Life Investment Management and chairman of New York Life Investment Management International, becomes chairman of the board of directors of Dexia Asset Management. She joined New York Life in 2010 with more than 25 years of industry experience, having most recently served as senior advisor at Bridgewater Associates and managing director and global head of strategic acquisitions and alliances at Morgan Stanley Investment Management. At Morgan Stanley, she also served as chief administrative officer, head of the firm’s private equity and absolute return businesses, and had responsibility for the business development effort of the alternative investments group. Prior to that, she was a managing director in Morgan Stanley’s investment banking division for a number of years.