Jan 5, 2022
Fiera’s Desjardins Steps Down After 18 Years as Lemay Promoted
Bloomberg News
,(Bloomberg) -- Fiera Capital Corp. said founder Jean-Guy Desjardins is stepping down as chief executive officer to make room for Jean-Philippe Lemay, whom he’s been grooming for the past two years.
Desjardins will become executive chairman and will remain active in “key strategic and investment decisions,” Montreal-based Fiera said in a statement on Wednesday.
The move was part of a succession plan put in place three years ago when Desjardins and the board designated Lemay as his most likely successor, Desjardins said in an interview. Two years into that process, “there was no value added to waiting for another year to do it. I was ready,” said Desjardins, who is 77 and has been CEO since the firm’s beginning in late 2003.
Lemay, 43, joined Fiera in 2012, was tapped to run its Canadian division five years later and promoted to president and chief operating officer in early 2020, leading its public markets and global distribution teams.
The firm managed C$181 billion ($142 billion) for institutions and wealthy clients in North America, Europe and Asia as of Sept. 30. The company has been getting more active in private assets, infrastructure and real estate in recent years.
Private markets will continue to grow in the coming years as investors shift from traditional fixed-income products to alternative sources of yield, Desjardins said. “I think that the wave that will be coming to that market segment in the next three or four or five years would be quite significant.”
Listed in Toronto, Fiera’s shares fell 1.8% last year. The stock has largely drifted in a range for years. At C$10.60, it’s only slightly higher than it was 15 years ago.
When asked what’s holding down the share price, Desjardins said Fiera isn’t large and liquid enough to be included in major indexes so it doesn’t benefit from the flow of money into passive index funds and exchange-traded funds. But its 8% dividend yield makes it one of the highest-paying Canadian stocks over C$1 billion in market value.
(Updates with quotes on private markets and stock price from sixth paragraph)
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