Nuveen Names Saira Malik as Global Chief Investment Officer

Nuveen has promoted veteran equities manager Saira Malik to chief investment officer with a remit to drive strategies for investing the Chicago-based fund manager’s $1.2 trillion in global assets under management, according to a statement on Tuesday.

Malik started her new role this month nearly two decades after she joined the investment management division of financial services giant TIAA-CREF as an equity research analyst, with the Bay Area executive now tasked with overseeing Nuveen’s investment teams and delivering market and investment insights across the firm’s fixed income, real estate and private markets divisions.

“Saira is dedicated to Nuveen’s mission of delivering strong returns to help secure the financial futures of clients and has been an essential part of the firm’s proud history and culture of deep investment expertise for nearly two decades,” said William Huffman, head of the firm’s fixed income and equity platform. “We are excited for Saira to leverage her skills and insights as our investment teams source additional alpha strategies and think in holistic portfolio terms to serve our clients as true partners.”

Nuveen, through its Nuveen Real Estate division, manages the $2 billion Asia Pacific Cities strategy, and last month closed on its $472 million purchase of a half stake in the 23-storey One George Street tower in Singapore’s Raffles Place.

Analyst to CIO

“An innovative thinker with more than 25 years of investment management experience, Saira’s expertise and insights make her an indispensable member of our firm, and the right person to lead our Global Investment Committee and $450 billion global equity business,” Nuveen chief executive Jose Minaya said on LinkedIn shortly after Malik’s upgrade was announced.

In her new role Malik will continue to report to Huffman and retain her asset management and leadership responsibilities for Nuveen’s $450 billion global equity business. With support from other senior leaders within the firm, she will also continue to act as portfolio manager for the $133 billion CREF stock strategy, the $37.84 billion CREF growth fund and the $27.21 billion CREF global equities fund.

Prior to this latest promotion, Malik, who first joined Nuveen in 2003, had served as chief investment officer for the firm’s equity division for more than four years and has been a global portfolio manager since 2007.

Before joining Nuveen, the University of Wisconsin graduate spent seven years with JP Morgan Asset Management as an equity portfolio manager and stock analyst.

Active in Asia

Malik’s promotion comes as the real estate arm of Nuveen continues to reorganize its executive roster in Asia Pacific, including in November hiring David H Chan, formerly of Phoenix Property Investors, to head its Greater China division.

In addition to its investment in One George Street, which it purchased in tandem with JP Morgan Asset Management, just over one year ago the firm teamed up with the Netherlands’ Bouwinvest and Japan’s Kenedix to purchase a Tokyo apartment portfolio for $226 million.

In October 2020, the company had purchased a logistics facility in Seoul for $122 million and in June last year reached practical completion on its SubStation No.164 office project in Sydney.