Harbour Asset Management has seen the departure of two veterans with the exits of long-time chair, Graeme Wong, and executive director, Ainsley McLaren.
McLaren has served as executive director client engagement at Harbour for about eight years following an almost 30-year career in the local institutional funds sector including senior investment positions at ASB and Westpac.
At the same time, Wong – on the Harbour board since 2009 – retired as chair at the end of March with fellow director, Murray Brown, stepping into the role.
Brown has “30 years of investment experience, including as a portfolio manager”, according to a Harbour statement.
“He has been serving as an independent director on Harbour’s Board since 2020.”
The changes also triggered a governance reshuffle with Graham Ansell, replacing Brown as chair of the Harbour audit, risk and regulation committee.
Ansell joined the Harbour board last October in the wake of the manager’s shift to new ownership under the FirstCape conglomerate also including BNZ Investments, Jarden and JBWere.
He took on governance duties at the BNZ fund business in 2019 after ending a 20-year run at ANZ – the last six as chief investment officer – the previous year.
Under the FirstCape structure finalised early last year, Harbour assumed control of the roughly $6 billion BNZ KiwiSaver and retail funds operation.
FirstCape chief, Malcolm Jackson, also stepped down from the Harbour board at the end of March with Nichola Hiatt filling the gap.
Hiatt, FirstCape general counsel, was named to the Harbour board in October 2024.
Jackson remains as director on a range of other FirstCape entities.
Meanwhile, Harbour investment sales specialist, Shannon Murphy, has shifted to Fisher Funds in a senior role servicing the intermediary market.
The Auckland-based Murphy moved to Harbour from the Lifetime Income business in 2019.
Elsewhere, the Australia-headquartered exchange-traded fund specialist, Betashares, is looking to beef up its NZ arm with a senior analyst job up for grabs.
The full-time role reports to Betashares NZ executive director, Hugh Stevens.
According to the job specs, duties include “helping design and launch investment products, engaging with financial advisers and investors, sharing insights, and ensuring our commercial strategies deliver results”.
Betashares officially opened shop in NZ in 2021, appointing former (and now current) Smartshares (now Smart) institutional head, Thom Bentley, to lead the charge.
Bentley resigned the following year while Stevens, ex Smartshares chief, took on the Betashares NZ position in 2023. Stevens also runs the UK pension transfer business, i-Select.
The Australian manager has released seven portfolio investment entity funds here (the latest a NZ ‘sustainable’ equities tracker in October last year) with about $200 million under management at the latest count.