Larry Fink and Rob Kapito are creating a $3.6-trillion-AUM unit within BlackRock [profile], led by a familiar executive.

J. Richard Kushel BlackRock Senior Managing Director, Head of the Portfolio Management Group

BlackRock's new Portfolio Management Group (PMG) will be led by senior managing director Rich Kushel, Kapito confirms in a recent internal memo (seen by MFWire). Kushel previously led multi-asset strategies and global fixed income.

"Our goal is greater accountability and nimbleness while promoting even more seamless One BlackRock collaboration to deliver solutions at scale for our clients," Kapito writes. "There is no impact to portfolio manager responsibilities from these changes."

Now, as head of PMG, Kushel oversees seven big teams: fundamental equities, led by Daniel Gamba and Becci McKinley-Rowe; fundamental fixed income, led by global fixed income CIO Rick Rieder; global lending, liquidity and private investors, led by Phil Vasan, who will also serve as deputy head of PMG; index fixed income and LDI, led by Alex Claringbull; multi-asset strategies and solutions (MASS), co-led by Ryan Marshall and Pierre Sarrau; municipals and FIG fixed income, led by Peter Hayes; and the systematic investments business, led by Raffaele Savi.

"Essentially, we have created a single organization with seven portfolio management businesses which together form the Portfolio Management Group (PMG)," a BlackRock spokesperson tells MFWire.

PMG will have three chief operating officers: Jennifer Ottinger (for systematic investing and fundamental equities), Jennifer Brann, and Wayne Fitzgerald. Chanel Frazier will serve as PMG's head of business strategy.

Kapito also reveals other changes, including: the combination of Global Capital Markets (GCM) and BlackRock Private Capital Markets (BPCM) teams into BlackRock Capital Markets, led by Brent Patry; the promotion of Jane Sloan to head of EMEA for the global product group (GPG); the promotion of Peter Leigh to head of overall relationship management with external counterparties; the expansion of the leadership roles of Samara Cohen (already co-head of EII markets and investments) and Carolyn Weinberg (already global head of iShares product); and more. 

Edited by: Neil Anderson, Managing Editor


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