Principal® Hires Industry Veteran George Maris as CIO, Global Head of Equities

By: Principal Asset Management via Business Wire

September 05, 2023 at 09:35 AM EDT

Principal Asset Management^SM announced today that George Maris is joining the firm as chief investment officer and global head of equities ($221.2 billion in AUM¹). In this role, he’ll take on leadership responsibilities across the equities’ platform, including managing 126 investment professionals across global investment centers. Maris will also serve as a named portfolio manager on international equity strategies.

Maris joins Principal with 25 years of industry experience, most recently serving as head of equities, Americas, at Janus Henderson and lead portfolio manager on the firm’s international and global alpha equity strategies. He has held several investment leadership and portfolio management positions throughout his career and has a proven history of generating strong investment results, improving performance, developing teams and innovating capabilities.

“As the investment business evolves, Principal continues to sharpen its global equities capabilities leveraging the complete span of investment teams across 26 countries,” said Kamal Bhatia, global head of investments, Principal Asset Management. “We’re excited to bring George on-board as a leader and portfolio manager to help advance our offerings across domestic, international, and emerging market equities, all of which are sought after active management strategies with our clients. His expertise and perspective – combined with our teams’ depth of experience – will create an exceptional value proposition for our retail, retirement, and institutional clients worldwide.”

Maris will be added as a named portfolio manager on the firm’s active fundamental public equities strategies including international mutual funds, variable annuities, and the Principal Life Insurance separate account. He’ll take on leadership responsibilities across the platform to help deliver strong and consistent outcomes for a wide range of investor objectives and grow the firm’s equities platform globally.

"I am excited to join Principal Asset Management to help create the best equities division globally on behalf of our clients,” said George Marris. “As the investment landscape becomes more challenging and our clients’ needs grow, there is an increased need for investors who can successfully manage the risks and take advantage of the opportunities that are constantly present in markets. I look forward to partnering with the strong team at Principal to successfully navigate these risks and opportunities in order to generate successful outcomes for our clients."

About George Maris

Maris joins Principal with 25 years of investment industry experience, most recently spending 12 years at Janus Henderson Investors serving as head of equities for the Americas region and lead portfolio manager on their international and global alpha equity strategies. Prior to Janus Henderson, he served as a portfolio manager for Northern Trust Global Investments where he was lead portfolio manager of the domestic core, international core and global equity strategies. Maris additionally was portfolio manager at Columbia Management Group serving as a portfolio manager on its large-cap and mid-cap core domestic equity strategies. He previously served as a portfolio manager, equity analyst, and derivatives strategist at Putnam Investments.

Maris served as guest lecturer at several universities including the MIT Sloan School of Management, Wake Forest University, and the University of Denver, where he is a member of the Executive Advisory Board of the Daniels College of Business at the University of Denver. Maris received his Bachelor of Arts in economics from Swarthmore College. He also earned a Master of Business Administration from the University of Chicago and a juris doctor from the University of Illinois. George is a holder of the right to use the Chartered Financial Analyst^® designation.

About Principal Asset Management^SM

With public and private market capabilities across all asset classes, Principal Asset Management and its investment specialists look at asset management through a different lens, creating solutions to help deliver client investment objectives. By applying local insights with global perspectives, Principal Asset Management identifies distinct and compelling investment opportunities for more than 1,100 institutional clients in over 80 markets.¹ Principal Asset Management is the global investment solutions business for Principal Financial Group^® (Nasdaq: PFG), managing $525.2 billion in assets¹ and recognized as a “Best Places to Work in Money Management”² for 11 consecutive years.

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¹ As of June 30, 2023

² Pensions & Investments, “The Best Places to Work in Money Management”, December 12, 2022

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