Plan sponsors may wish to consider whether this investment news has any implications for the investment options available within their plans.

Fiera Capital Corporation (“Fiera”) announced a structural change to its global management structure, effective July 1, 2020. Fiera shifted from a regional model to a global structure, with three working groups, defined by business type: public markets, private markets, and private wealth.

Fiera has grown significantly over the years, largely via acquisitions, and, to a lesser degree, organically. With each acquisition, Fiera would mostly accept the acquired companies’ support functions. Fiera felt that the previous regional-based business structure created redundancies and the new structure would increase efficiencies.

As part of these changes, Francois Bourdon stepped down as Chief Investment Officer (CIO) on July 1, 2020.  He will continue to stay as a consultant to the firm until the end of 2020. 

Nicholas Papageorgiou, former deputy CIO, assumed Bourdon’s duties and is now CIO of Public Markets.  Papageorgiou oversaw roughly 85% of the portfolio management teams prior to the restructuring. He will now oversee the rest of the portfolio management teams. The restructuring will result in the termination of about 50 of the firm's non-investment employees. According to Fiera, these reductions do not influence the investment teams.

Sun Life’s GRS Investment Solutions team met with Fiera to look at these changes. While these changes influence Fiera’s senior leadership structure, they do not change day-to-day portfolio decisions. We will continue to keep track of the investment teams, which have been stable to this point.  None of Fiera’s funds are on our Watch List at this time.  

Questions?
Please contact the Sun Life Group Retirement Services team.