People moves: USS loses chief financial officer

VFPK, USS, BPL, FIN-FSA, Veritas, PMI, ING CDC, NN CDC, Pensioenfonds AFM, Royal London, Cheyne Capital, BlueBay Asset Management, Law Debenture, Investcorp

Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) – Jennifer Halliday, chief financial officer at the UK’s largest pension scheme, resigned on 31 March, according to USS’s annual report. She joined USS in 2014 from Quaker Chemical Corporation, and spent 13 years at Vanguard Group. Glen Lucken has been appointed CFO in the interim until a permanent replacement is found.

Verband der Firmenpensionskassen (VFPK) – Andreas Hilka, member of the board of at the €7.9bn German Hoechst Pensionskasse and former European head of pensions at Allianz Global Investors, has been elected to the board of the German association of company pension schemes. He will be the board member with chief responsibility for investment and investment supervision. Hilka succeeds Norbert Schulte-Mattler, of the Philips Pensionskasse, who had been VFPK’s board for several years. Peter Hadasch of Nestlé Pensionkasse, Helmut Aden of the BVV insurance association for the banking sector, and Carsten Ebsen of the Hamburger Pensionskasse, were re-elected to the board.

BPL Pensioen – Willem van den Nieuwenhof has been appointed board member of BPL Pensioen, the €16.4bn pension fund for the agriculture sector, representing the association of horticulturalists. He has also become a member of BPL’s committee for compliance and communication. Previously, Van den Nieuwenhof was a board member of the company pension fund of Heinz as well as the sector scheme for the fruit and vegetable processing industry, which both joined BPL last year.

FIN-FSA/Veritas — Kaisa Forsström, the deputy chief executive of Veritas Pension Insurance Company, has been been appointed to head insurance supervision at the FIN-FSA, the Finnish Financial Supervisory Authority (Finanssivalvonta). She will take up the new role on 11 September to serve a five-year term. As a head of department at the regulatory body, she will be a member of the FIN-FSA’s management group and she will report directly to the Director General Anneli Tuominen.

Pensions Management Institute (PMI) – Robert Branagh is the new president of the UK professional body, with effect from yesterday, 2 August. He succeeded Kevin LeGrand, who had been president since July 2015. Branagh has more than 30 years experience in the pension industry, in both the private and public sector, including as managing director of RPMI Railpen’s administration business. He is currently chair of the Armed Forces Pension Scheme, alongside several non-executive and trustee roles. He joined the board of PMI in the autumn of 2014 before becoming vice president in 2015.

ING CDC, NN CDC – The pension funds ING CDC and NN CDC have named Sandra van Eijk as board member, focusing on finance, risk and investment. Since 2010, Van Eijk has worked as chief financial officer and chief risk officer for private clients at NN Bank. Prior to this, she worked at Postbank, ING, insurer RVS and WestlandUtrecht Bank, covering finance, accounting, actuarial and risk matters. The two pension funds were established in 2014, following banc-assurer ING’s split into ING Bank and NN. Although separate, the pension funds have a close co-operation and have many joint board members.

Pensioenfonds AFM – Jaap Koelewijn has been appointed as board member of the pension fund of communication watchdog AFM. Koelewijn is professor of finance at Nyenrode Business University and was head of research at the AFM between 2001 and 2003. Earlier in his career he was internal supervisor at the company scheme of engineering firm DHV, the sector pension fund for housing corporations (SPW) as well as member of the investment committees at the pension funds Hoogovens and ANWB.

Royal London – The mutual life, pensions and investment company has appointed Olivia Dickson as non-executive director. She has held many positions in financial services over a long career. Her current roles include being non-executive director of the Financial Reporting Council, where she chairs the actuarial council, and a member of the UK government’s advisory group on social impact investing.

Cheyne Capital – The London-based asset manager has hired Anthony Robertson to launch a new sub-investment grade credit business. Robertson was formerly head of leveraged finance at BlueBay Asset Management. He will lead the new business – SVC – as its chief investment officer. Cheyne Capital has also hired David Lofts from investment banking firm Seaport Group as head of trading and origination, and two senior analysts, Jacopo Rubbia and Jorge Lazaro.

The company said SVC would continue hiring with a view to building a team of 10 people across research, trading, strategy, origination and legal. The boutique’s first strategy will focus on “heightened illiquidity in European sub-investment grade credit”, Cheyne said.

Law Debenture Pension Trustees – Andrew Harrison has joined the company’s investment team. He was most recently at Aberdeen Asset Management, where he was head of fixed income product specialists. He also been managing director at BlackRock, head of UK liability-driven investment strategy at Barclays Global Investors and derivatives portfolio manager at Salomon Brothers.