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Gareth Stobie has left 10X Investments to join etfSA, where he will be leading the exchange traded fund provider’s product development and expansion initiatives.
Stobie is the former MD of CoreShares, another index-tracking investment product provider which he helped found and will be joining etfSA as an executive director responsible for strategy and corporate development.
10X Investments, which is owned by Old Mutual Private Equity and London-based DiGame Investment, agreed to buy CoreShares in May 2022 but the transaction was only finalised in December 2022, following a longer-than-expected regulatory approval process.
That deal saw Stobie move over to 10X Investments’ management team to ensure a smooth integration of CoreShares. Stobie, who finished up at 10X at end-September 2023, says that integration process is now complete though some legacy branding of CoreShares products still exists in the marketplace.
"etfSA already has a strong profile but there are also some exciting new things one can do with it – I’ll be looking at fresh opportunities and ways that we can grow the business," Stobie, who started at etfSA on 1 October, told News24.
"A lot of the growth in the wealth, savings and investment market in recent years has been driven by passive investing building blocks…and how you marry that up with the advice process. That’s where etfSA wants to position itself."
etfSA has played a pioneering role in the development of passive investment strategies in SA and has over the years evolved into a fully-fledged discretionary financial services provider, multi-manager, investment platform, financial advisory and research firm focused on Exchange Traded Products (ETPs).
The low-cost index-tracking specialist, which is also licenced to give financial advice, was founded by Mike Brown, who helped establish Satrix, which he managed from 2003 to 2009 before leaving to establish etfSA.
The company also designs, manages, and administers investment portfolios of ETPs for wealthy clients in South Africa and internationally. Stobie will join Brown and Nerina Visser, who works as a strategist and advisor at etfSA, which she joined in 2015.
"We would like to give clients a bit more guided architecture," Stobie said when asked what he would be focusing on in his new role.
"We’re licensed to give advice, so we’d like to take a call from a client and go beyond just providing product to giving advice during the process as well," he said. "We want to provide more curated products and guided architecture around which ETFs [exchange traded funds] clients should buy and why. Another exciting element is that etfSA has offshore capabilities so we can run client portfolios in hard currency."
Stobie will retain a small shareholding in 10X Investments following its merger with CoreShares, a company in which he originally held a stake along with management.
