Fidelity to Lose Asset Management Chief

Fidelity president Abby Johnson announced O’Hanley’s pending departure in a letter sent to company employees. In the letter, Johnson credits O’Hanley with helping to stabilize and revitalize the organization after the 2008-2009 financial crisis.

“Having achieved much of what he intended to do, Ron has decided that it’s now time for him to move on,” Johnson writes. “The Asset Management organization is performing well and is well-positioned for continued success.”

It’s been a relatively short tenure with Fidelity for O’Hanley. He first joined the company in 2010, after serving as chief executive for BNY Asset Management.

During his work with Fidelity, O’Hanley led the globalization of investment teams and helped drive improved performance across asset classes, Vincent G. Loporchio, senior vice president for corporate media relations, tells PLANADVISER.

O’Hanley also piloted enhancements to both new and existing products, Loporchio says. These include the expansion of Fidelity’s sector business with 10 new passive-sector ETFs; SEC [Securities and Exchange Commission] filings for five active fixed-income ETFs; the Fidelity Event Driven Opportunities Fund; the allocation of assets in Fidelity’s managed account offering to alternative-like mutual funds from Blackstone and Arden; and enhancements to Fidelity’s target-date fund glide path based on extensive research and analysis.

O’Hanley will remain with Fidelity through February to assist in the transition to new leadership for the asset management business. He wrote in a separate letter to Fidelity employees that he plans to spend more time with his family, and with a few nonprofits that are “very important to him.”

Johnson says in her letter that the company expects to name an internal successor in the coming weeks.