Koesterich will be responsible for communicating the firm’s strategy and market outlook to investors and financial advisers, New York-based BlackRock said today in a statement. Koesterich will report to Ken Kroner, global head of the firm’s multi-asset strategies group.
BlackRock, which manages $3.67 trillion, started a five- year branding campaign earlier this year as it seeks to get investors back into higher-yielding assets such as stocks. Chief Executive Officer Laurence D. Fink and other BlackRock executives have said that clients need to diversify and can be harmed by staying in cash-like products.
“The financial world is more uncertain than it’s ever been and a succession of seismic events has left investors unsure of what to do next,” Koesterich said in the statement. “We believe that opportunities do exist for investors.”
Koesterich, who in 2010 was named global investment strategist for BlackRock’s iShares exchange-traded fund business, will continue in that role, according to today’s statement. Koesterich was previously the global head of investment strategy for active equities and was a senior portfolio manager in the U.S. market-neutral group at Barclays Global Investors, which BlackRock acquired in 2009.
Bloomberg News
