RI People & Appointments, April 8: Ex-AP2 chief Idermark resigns as Swedbank chair

Lars Idermark, the former CEO of Swedish state fund Andra AP-fonden (AP2), has resigned as chairman of Swedbank over the Baltic money laundering scandal that has also cost the job of CEO Birgitte Bonnesen. He said the negative press was “not compatible” with his current role as CEO of forestry group Södra. Idermark will be replaced by deputy Chair Ulrika Francke. Swedbank has a strong sustainability focus via its funds arm Swedbank Robur and Swedbank Försäkring, which offers pension insurance and pension plans. Idermark was succeeded at AP2 by Eva Halvarsson in 2005.

Bjarne Graven Larsen, the former chief investment officer at both the Danish labour market pension fund ATP and the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, has launched his own firm with several other former ATP executives. Qblue Capital is described as a “systematic asset manager” based in Copenhagen and its first product is a multi-strategy risk premia fund called Qblue Luxembourg, SICAV SIF, which is expected to launch within a few months, targeted at international professional investors.

Chris Ouellette has been named Head of CSR at BNP Paribas Asset Management. He joins from Manulife Financial Corporation, where he was Head of Global Corporate Citizenship, and will be based in Paris reporting to Ambachtsheer, Global Head of Sustainability.

Axel Kleinlein of the German Association of the Insured BdV (Bund der Versicherten) has been elected president of Better Finance, aka the Brussels-based European Federation of Investors and Financial Services Users. He takes over from Jella Benner-Heinacher of DSW, the German association for private investors, who becomes a Vice-President along with Jean Berthon, President of Gaipare – the French Association for the Improvement of Retirement and Savings.

Mervyn Tang, Head of Fixed Income, ESG Research at global index provider MSCI, has re-joined big three credit ratings agency Fitch Ratings as Head of ESG Research of its Sustainable Finance Group. Tang, who previously worked at the Bank of England as an Economist, left Fitch for MSCI in 2017. Based in Hong Kong, he will now report to Andrew Steel, Global Group Head of Sustainable Finance.

Lucinda Riches, former Global Head of Equity Capital Markets at UBS Investment Bank, has been named a non-executive director at listed renewable infrastructure fund Greencoat UK Wind.

Eileen Taggart has been appointed Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer of the Church Pensions Group, pensions provider for the Episcopal Church in the US. She reports to CEO Mary Kate Wold and replaces former CFO Dan Kasle, who has retired.

Toby Belsom has been joined the Principles for Responsible Investment as Director of Investment Practices, according to his LinkedIn profile. Previously he spent two years at campaign group ShareAction where he was Head of Investor Research & Analytics. Prior to that, he was a portfolio manager at Aviva Investors and Henderson Global Investors.Ingo Speich, formerly a fund manager at Union Invest where he headed the Sustainability and Engagement Team, has moved to Deka Investment, taking up the role of Head of Sustainability and Corporate Governance. Speich is also a member of the Corporate Governance Commission of DVFA, a German trade body for investment professionals.

Paula Loop and Deborah DeHaas – from PwC and Deloitte respectively – have been elected to the SASB Foundation board, which oversees the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board.

Dominique Blanc has been named Sustainable Finance Expert at Natixis CIB Green Sustainable Hub. The Hub provides issues and investor clients with green and sustainable research, investment structuring and advisory. Previously Blanc was Head of Research at Novethic, the French ‘sustainable transformation accelerator’ and a visiting professor of sustainable finance at KEDGE business school in Marseille.

Deb Abbey, ex-CEO of Canada’s Responsible Investment Association (RIA), has been appointed to the BC Securities Commission, securities regulator for British Columbia.

Joanne Segars is the newest member of the Legal & General Independent Governance Committee (IGC) which was established in 2015 to oversee the governance of L&G’s contract-based workplace pension plans. Segars has held various senior roles in the UK pensions world and is the current chair of LGPS Central.

Charles Kalshoven has started in a new role as Senior Strategist at APG, the asset manager of Dutch pension fund ABP. Kalshoven is an expert in scenario and economic analysis, and was previously an economist at Shell and subsequently a Senior Investment Strategist at PGGM.

David Korslund, Senior Advisor at the Global Alliance for Banking on Values (GABV), has announced his retirement on LinkedIn after ten years at the global network of sustainability focused banking leaders. Korslund was previously with Dutch bank ABN AMRO.

Ruth van de Belt, has been named as Fund Manager for the Triodos Sustainable Mixed Fund, replacing previous manager Erik Breen. Van de Belt joined Triodos over a year ago as Senior Investment Strategist from Kempen Capital Management.

Marie Rudberg has been elected chair of AMF, the SEK590bn ((€56.5bn) Swedish pension company that is owned equally by the Swedish Trade Union Confederation (LO) and the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise. She takes over from former Swedish finance minister Pär Nuder, who has also recently stepped down as chair of AP3, at the end of his term, and from the same role at real estate firm Fabege. It comes after Nuder has been subject to media allegations of unspecified “inappropriate behaviour” in his role as chair of chairman of a ski resort company which he has denied.