There were changes again this week to the leadership of the Alberta Investment Management Corp., with few details about why or how.
In a statement on Monday, AIMCo, the $125 billion institution that invests on behalf of pension, endowment, insurance, and government funds in the Province of Alberta, said that CIO Marlene Puffer was leaving. Additionally, the organization announced that two employees were promoted and both would be part of the executive team, effective immediately. A spokesperson for the organization said Thursday that Puffer is no longer with the organization.
Justin Lord was named a senior executive managing director as well as the global head of public markets (a newly established leadership role) and became part of the executive team. David Scudellari was also named a senior executive managing director and the global head of private assets and strategic partnerships. Scudellari, who was already a member of the executive team, will have a “broadened” role, AIMCo said.
“I am very pleased to appoint Justin and David to their new leadership roles in leading investments for AIMCo. I am especially excited to welcome Justin to the executive team. These appointments confirm the benefits of our focus on developing talented investment leaders from within the firm and Alberta. David and Justin both bring decades of investment experience, and I am excited to be so well-positioned to continue to fulfill our purpose to our clients, as we execute our investment strategy under their leadership,” AIMCo CEO Evan Siddall said in the statement. AIMCo achieved a balanced fund net investment rate of return of 8 percent in 2023. Its 10-year annualized return is 7.3 percent.
“I want to thank Dr. Puffer for her deep commitment and for the value she has added. Her passion for investing on behalf of our clients is undeniable and her contributions to the organization will continue to position AIMCo for success in the future. We wish her the very best,” Siddall added.
Neither AIMCo nor Puffer could be reached about the reason for her departure after just two years as CIO.
It’s unclear whether AIMCo will hire a traditional CIO to replace Puffer or keep Lord and Scudellari in their “new leadership roles in leading investments for AIMCo,” long term.
Finding a new CIO for the largest institutional investors (AIMCo has offices in Edmonton, Calgary, Toronto, London, Luxembourg, New York, and Singapore, and more than 200 investment professionals) isn’t easy. It took a year and half for CalPERS to hire Nicole Musicco, who then left abruptly in the fall of 2023 to tend to immediate family needs in Toronto. CalPERS said it hoped to fill the position in January, a goal that recruiters said was aggressive. But it hired Stephen Gilmore seven months later in April.
Puffer replaced Sandra Lau, a 24-year employee of AIMCo and the interim CIO, in December of 2022. Lau left the organization shortly after.
There have been other AIMCo shake ups in recent years, including the departure of CEO Kevin Uebelein in 2020, after it lost billions on wayward volatility trades (to be fair, it was not alone) and became the center of bitter political battles between the province’s far-right government and its own unionized clients.
