Noah Holdings creates CIO role

Chinese wealth manager Noah Holdings has appointed William Ma, formerly of Gottex Penjing Asset Management, as its first chief investment officer in Hong Kong, AsianInvestor has learned.

He started in the role on Monday (November 2) and will oversee the $2 billion in overseas investments under Gopher, Noah’s asset management arm, which runs a total $10.4 billion, mostly in funds of funds.

Ma was previously CIO at Gottex Penjing, the Asian arm of Gottex Fund Management, a Swiss alternative investment firm with $8.5 billion in AUM as of June. He he had been promoted to that role from deputy CIO role earlier this year, before leaving the firm on November 1 to join Noah.

Ronnie Wu assumes Ma’s responsibilities at Gottex Penjing and continues to oversee the investment team.

Founded in 2005, Noah distributes wealth management products, including fixed income products, private equity fund products, mutual fund products and insurance products. It also manages private equity funds, real estate funds, hedge funds and other assets through Gopher Asset Management.

At Gottex Penjing, Ma had managed the Asian investment team and was lead portfolio manager of all Gottex’s Asian funds of hedge funds, focusing on portfolio management, hedge fund due diligence and manager selection.

Before joining GPAM, he was founder and portfolio manager of Penjing Asset Management, running funds of hedge funds. Before founding Penjing in 2005, he worked at Vision Investment Management (Asia) specialising in Asian hedge fund due diligence.

Ma has also worked as a research analyst at HT Capital Management, a pan-Asia long/short equity hedge fund management firm.