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Abrdn and Schroders named new chief executives on Tuesday, with both UK asset managers turning to finance directors as the pressure to cut costs and revive profits intensifies.
Abrdn on Tuesday handed Jason Windsor, its former chief financial officer, the top job on a permanent basis. Windsor has held the role on an interim basis since the exit of Stephen Bird in May.
Schroders announced that its chief financial officer Richard Oldfield would take over from Peter Harrison as chief executive in November, a decision first reported by the Financial Times this month.
The pair will take the helm facing the challenge of reviving the fortunes of asset managers that have each struggled to adapt to an era of low fees and the rise of passive investing.
“I don’t believe that I have ever seen two CFOs promoted to CEO in the same sector on the same day,” said Rae Maile, analyst at Panmure Liberum. “Like London buses . . . Both good appointments. Both have similar issues of underperforming businesses where costs are too high.”
Sir Douglas Flint, chair of Abrdn, said Windsor “emerged from what was a very thorough process as the unanimous choice of the Board to lead abrdn in its next phase”.
The FT also reported last month that Windsor, a former senior Aviva executive, was poised to take the top job at Abrdn. Flint said the succession process considered both internal and external candidates.
Windsor’s promotion comes after a turbulent four years for the asset manager, in which it has twice been ejected from the FTSE 100 and suffered from a much ridiculed rebranding, when its Standard Life Aberdeen brand was ditched for Abrdn.
Windsor joined Abrdn last October. Before this, he worked at housebuilder Persimmon as chief financial officer for just over a year, having previously held the same role at insurance company Aviva, where he worked for 15 years.
Bird had attempted to broaden Abrdn by expanding its wealth management business and by selling more investments directly to consumers through its acquisition of Interactive Investor, the UK’s second-largest investment site by assets, for £1.5bn in 2021.
He restructured underperforming parts of the company by merging or closing more than 250 of its investment funds and offloading peripheral businesses and joint ventures. Earlier this year, Bird cut about 500 jobs, amounting to 10 per cent of the workforce, to save on costs.
Schroders, meanwhile, has sought to offset the decline of its traditional mutual funds business by pushing into fast-growing areas such as private markets and wealth management.
Announcing the appointment of Oldfield, Schroders chair Elizabeth Corley said: “Richard has proven himself to be a natural leader of client focused, people centric businesses. He has a global perspective, a strategic growth mindset and a proven record of leadership.”