The board of directors of Första AP-fonden (AP1) has appointed Kristin Magnusson Bernard as chief executive.
She will assume the role on 1 September 2020, at the latest, and replaces Teresa Isele who has held the role on an interim basis since September 2019.
Heavy hitter
Magnusson Bernard has worked in the financial industry since 2009 and was most recently markets country executive and global head of macro research at Nordea, according to her LinkedIn profile.
She joined the bank in 2016 and has had several leading positions within the markets and investment banking divisions of Nordea.
Prior to that, Magnusson Bernard held senior positions at the European Central Bank (ECB) in Frankfurt, as well as at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Washington DC.
She has a PhD in macroeconomics from the Stockholm School of Economics.
Strategic and analytical
In Magnusson Bernard, the pension fund is “getting a CEO who combines long-standing experience from leading specialist and high-performing teams with excellent communication skills”, board chairman Urban Hansson Brusewitz said.
“Kristin possesses broad and deep experience from the financial industry, both in Sweden and an international context, where she developed strategic and analytical asset management capabilities.
“Further, her strong commitment and engagement in sustainability matters will be valuable for the fund’s continued work in this field,” he added.
AP1
Första AP-fonden is one of five pension funds in the Swedish national income pension system.
It has assets under management of SEK352bn (€33.4bn) as of 30 June 2019, in a portfolio consisting of listed equities, fixed income securities, currency, real estate, hedge funds, private equity funds, infrastructure and high yield.
Investments are made worldwide and the fund imposes stringent demands in the areas of environment, social and governance (ESG).
