American Century hires ex-Macquarie exec

American Century Investments hired Elizabeth Trinh in December as vice-president in Hong Kong to focus on institutional sales in Australia and South Asia.

The creation of this role follows the addition of Miranda Poon and Betty Ng to the US fund manager's Asian institutional advisory group in September. Trinh will report to Asia-Pacific business head Tony Archer, formerly of Morgan Stanley Investment Management.

Trinh's experience of the Australian fund market will be valuable, says Archer, and her focus on Australia and South Asia (excluding India and the subcontinent) will complement Poon's coverage of Greater China.

The firm has "no concrete plans" to set up regional offices beyond Hong Kong, he adds, but is "constantly looking at new opportunities".

As for how American Century is doing in terms of business development in the region, Archer would only say it has had "some success with sophisticated institutional ex-US clients and this will give us a good foundation for the future".

Trinh joins the firm from Macquarie Bank in Australia, where she was an associate manager with responsibility for the business development of the Macquarie Professional Series suite of funds. Before that, she was a financial planner at Commonwealth Financial Planning, part of Commonwealth Bank of Australia, in Melbourne.

With $85.8 billion in assets under management, American Century specialises in actively managed equity strategies. The Hong Kong office opened in May to support the delivery of American Century's equity growth strategies -- global growth, emerging markets and US growth equities -- in the Asia-Pacific region.