Bill Gross Defends Tough Management Style

“Yes, Mohamed’s departure was a surprise,” Hodge said. “But a selection committee formed of senior leaders at the firm, of which Bill was the chair, went through the process of looking at internal candidates and, if it was felt necessary, to look externally as well. I was their choice.”

Asked if it takes six people to fill El-Erian’s shoes — Dan Ivascyn, Andrew Balls, Mark Kiesel, Scott Mather, Mihir Worah and Virginie Maisonneuve, who are all deputy CIOs, Hodge was definitive: “No, we are not filling Mohamed’s shoes; we are doing something different.”

He says that this also paves the way for what is to come when Gross retires and there is no longer an executive like El-Erian waiting in the wings.

“I would contend that, by having more people in this deputy role, it secures our future,” Hodge told the Financial Times. “There was this expectation that Mohamed would be the presumptive successor to Bill, but when you identify that person so far in advance of the actual event, you obviously underwrite some risk.”

With the current mix of six deputy CIOs, “any of whom could potentially move into the role of CIO at some point,” Hodge explained, “we are able to safeguard our business.”

Gross has told CNBC that he has “at least a good five years left” in him.

Hodge also rejects the notion that El-Erian left PIMCO because of an argument.

“No, I would reject that proposition at its very start,” said Hodge. “We operate in a very competitive marketplace. Success and failure is measured in hundredths of percentages, and one of the main reasons why we have been so successful is because we are a very competitive organization. To maintain that competitiveness, however, there has to be a sense of intellectual challenge within the organization.”

Whether or not such a challenge — and its associated tension — will continue at PIMCO without El-Erian remains to be seen.

Hodge, though, says he will stay on regardless. “I am not going anywhere,” he stressed.