KTCU mandates Fidelity and Goldman Sachs AM

The $14.1 billion Korea Teachers Credit Union has agreed to enter into what it terms a strategic relationship with Fidelity International and Goldman Sachs Asset Management (GSAM).

Such arrangements are increasingly common in South Korea, where an asset owner seeks a deeper level of training and hand-holding, in return for providing chunkier investment mandates at a later date.

The country's $240 billion National Pension Service inaugurated such an approach with Credit Suisse and Morgan Stanley Investment Managers two years ago. NPS says it continues to work with those partners.

GSAM has already struck at least one such deal with Korea Teachers Pension Fund, in conjunction with ING Investment Management, in which the US firm is charged with helping the $8 billion asset owner allocate to global equities.

This is Fidelity's first such agreement in Korea. The firm is boosting its institutional sales effort there. In addition to signing up KTCU, it has hired a new head of institutional sales, Casey Choe, who previously ran sales at Prudential Financial's local unit. Choe inherited negotiations between Fidelity and KTCU and ushered the deal to fruition.

GSAM has also recently bolstered its sales team with the hire of Terence Lim as co-chief executive for the Korea business.