George Patterson to join QMA, co-lead unified Global Equity Platform with Peter Xu

By PGIM Global Communications — Sep 11, 2017

3 mins

NEWARK, N.J., Sept. 11, 2017 – George N. Patterson will join QMA’s investment team to co-lead a unified Global Equity Platform, aligning the firm’s U.S. Value, U.S. Core and Non-U.S. Core investment strategies under one leadership team. The new platform will allow QMA to refine and customize products in response to the needs of its global client base, consistent with its long-term, research-led investment philosophy.

Patterson and Peter Xu, current head of U.S. Core strategies, will serve as the new co-heads of the unified platform. Patterson and Xu will report to QMA Chief Investment Officer Roy Henriksson. Patterson will join QMA on Oct. 2.

QMA will maintain strategy-specific differentiation under the current strategy heads with respect to existing models and portfolio management. Patterson will focus on portfolio management, while Xu will focus on research across all global equity strategies. Xu, who has played a critical role in the evolution of QMA’s quantitative models and investment process for more than two decades at the company, will also remain head of U.S. Core.

“A unified global platform builds on our team approach to investing, and allows QMA to extend and deepen our research and portfolio management capabilities, particularly with an eye to higher-alpha strategies and global leverage,” said Andrew Dyson, chairman and CEO of QMA. “George’s wealth of experience leading strategic initiatives within the quantitative investment arena, combined with Peter’s depth of experience at QMA, will help us continue to deliver long-term, value-added performance on behalf of our clients.”

QMA, the quantitative investment and asset allocation business of PGIM, the global investment management businesses of Prudential Financial, Inc. (NYSE: PRU), managed $130 billion as of June 30, 2017.

Biographies
George Patterson was most recently managing director, Corporate Strategy, at Axioma, Inc., focusing on identifying buy-side trends and market opportunities to foster growth at the company. He was previously chief investment officer for Quantitative Investments at Bank of Montreal Global Asset Management, with more than $60 billion of investments in global equities and multi-asset strategies spanning stand-alone asset allocation funds, FX overlays, retail fund of funds and ETF-based multi-asset solutions.

George Patterson

Earlier, Patterson was co-founder and a managing partner at Menta Capital LLC, a California-based quantitative equity hedge fund, and a senior portfolio manager in equity market neutral strategies at Barclays Global Investors. He began his career at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Patterson is a Boston University graduate with a bachelor’s degree in physics, and has a Ph.D. in physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Peter Xu has been managing director and strategy head for U.S. Core Equity at QMA. For more than 20 years, Xu has played a critical role in the evolution of QMA’s quantitative models and investment processes, which have delivered such strong performance across all equity strategies. He has published articles in several journals, including The Financial Analysts Journal, The Journal of Portfolio Management, The Journal of Asset Management, The Journal of Investing, and the Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, among others.

Peter Xu

Xu earned a Ph.D. in finance from the University of Houston, a master’s in economics from Rice University, and a bachelor’s in nuclear physics from Fudan University in Shanghai.

About QMA
QMA applies a disciplined, research-driven approach that seeks to identify and capture alpha opportunities and combines factor exposures to create diversified, risk-aware strategies designed for long-term, consistent performance.

Founded in 1975, QMA manages portfolios for a worldwide institutional client base, including corporate and public pension plans, endowments and foundations, multi-employer pension plans, and sub-advisory accounts for other financial services companies. As of June 30, 2017, QMA had approximately $130 billion assets under management.

About PGIM and Prudential Financial, Inc.
With 14 consecutive years of positive third-party institutional net flows, PGIM, the global asset management businesses of Prudential Financial, Inc. (NYSE: PRU), ranks among the top 10 largest asset managers in the world with more than $1 trillion in assets under management as of June 30, 2017. PGIM’s businesses offer a range of investment solutions for retail and institutional investors around the world across a broad range of asset classes, including fundamental equity, quantitative equity, public fixed income, private fixed income, real estate and commercial mortgages. Its businesses have offices in 16 countries across five continents. For more information, please visit pgim.com.

Prudential’s additional businesses offer a variety of products and services, including life insurance, annuities and retirement-related services. For more information about PGIM, please visit pgim.com. For more information about Prudential, please visit news.prudential.com.