Aviva Investors

Aviva Investors

Aviva Investors is an asset management company and is part of the Aviva group. It has global assets under management of over £315 billion,[1] including equities (£41 billion of UK and international equities), fixed income (£144 billion of fixed-income assets, bonds and money market instruments), investment solutions, multi-asset, and property investments (£24 billion of UK and European property assets, making it one of the largest property fund managers in Europe).

Aviva Investors employs over 1,000 staff, including 400 investment managers, research analysts, economists and strategists (as at December 2013). The majority of employees are based in London.

The London unit, previously known as Morley, was founded in 1971 as Geoffrey Morley and Partners, This was bought by Globe Investment in 1988 and sold to Commercial Union, becoming CU Morley in 1990 and rebranded as Morley Fund Management.

This organisation became the London-based asset management division of CGU in 1999 following the merger with General Accident and in 2000 Morley merged with Norwich Union Investment Management following the earlier merger of CGU with Norwich Union.

History

Aviva plc was created following the merger of CGU (Commercial General Union) and Norwich Union in May 2000 but its roots can be traced back over 300 years.

Norwich Union was founded in 1797, while CGU origins go back to 1696 when ‘Hand-in-Hand’ (one of the earliest fire insurance companies) was established. This was one of many companies that later became absorbed into CGU. The merger of CGU plc and Norwich Union plc in May 2000 created a successor company, Aviva plc (formerly CGNU plc) following the purchase of Geoffrey Morley & Partners. In July 2000 the asset management businesses of Morley Fund Management Ltd and Norwich Union Investment Management Ltd were merged. This business subsequently became Aviva Investors Global Services Limited in September 2008.

The Central Bank of Ireland fined Aviva Investors in July 2011 for failing to have proper controls and procedures surrounding the safeguarding of client assets.[2][3]

Corporate responsibility

Aviva Investors is a founding signatory and a strong supporter of the UN Principles for Responsible Investment (UN PRI) and plays a formal role in the UN PRI and actively participate in leading engagements through the UN PRI Clearing House.

Aviva Investors are committed to the principles of the UK Stewardship Code and International Corporate Governance Network (ICGN) Global Corporate Governance Principles and are signatories to the UN Global Compact and formally recognise international standards such as the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Labour Organisation core labour standards.

Aviva Investors are proactively engaged in initiatives (such as the Rio+20 call to action) to correct market failures through engagement with policy makers (at a national, EU and UN level).

In July 2013, the UK Government’s Innovation and Skills Select Committee published its inquiry into the Kay Review of the equity markets and long-term decision making. The committee published Aviva Investors’ policy proposal as one of its primary recommendations to Government in its report.

Senior management

In July 2013 Aviva announced the appointment of Euan Munro as CEO of Aviva Investors. Euan has taken up the role in January 2014 and will join the Aviva Group Executive reporting to Mark Wilson, Group Chief Executive Officer.

See also

Notes and references

  1. ↑ "Aviva Investors company information". Archived from the original on 2 December 2008. Retrieved 2012-06-30.
  2. ↑ "Central Bank fines Aviva Investors Ireland". RTÉ News. 2011-07-22.
  3. ↑ Madden, Caroline (2011-07-23). The Irish Times http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2011/0723/1224301203603.html. Missing or empty |title= (help)
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