Andrew Schlossberg, CEO at US giant fund house Invesco, frowns at any talk of revolutions in technology and private assets, believing investment firms must first focus on returns.

“The last place where technology will get applied is in the investments area,” says Andrew Schlossberg. “The primary places will be in distribution and operating efficiency.”
Sourcing investments from Europe is becoming an increasing priority for Invesco, with funds from outside its US homeland now nudging 40 per cent of “long-term assets” and $270bn of the total $2tn portfolio.
While the firm described second quarter inflows as a “bit more tepid” following market volatility around President Donald Trump’s tariffs, over the previous 12 months Invesco saw net new money of $34bn garnered from the Emea region. This flowed into investment grade fixed income, alternative credit strategies, active global equities, and a range of exchange traded fund (ETF) products.This focus on efficient asset gathering, across a variety of strategies — combined with investment returns — has been a hallmark leadership trait of Atlanta-based CEO Andrew Schlossberg, who has been with the firm since 2001.

Much of his time with Invesco has been spent in London. “In particular the UK has been quite strong for us as a growth market,” confirms Mr Schlossberg. Asia is a close second. His team of business strategists are concentrating on maximising flows from these two sources.

In particular the UK has been quite strong for us as a growth market

Their thinking has been that while many investors have been turned off by Brexit, changes in the UK’s retirement space from defined benefit pension schemes to defined contributions are favouring managers able to adapt to a retail mindset.

Both in Europe and beyond, Mr Schlossberg says he has concentrated on fashioning an “integrated global asset manager”, able to adapt to local sensitivities. This is characterised by strong conviction around investment themes, balancing private and public assets, along with active and passive investments. He contrasts this approach with the “fragmented” firm he joined soon after the turn of the millennium, managing $400bn at the time.

During his intense and challenging journey to create a “single global brand” through investing in technology and people, it is the digitalisation hurdle which has proved the most onerous.

“We’re an industry that’s got so much data, and we’ve got complex operating systems, whether that’s client engagement or the way we do portfolio reporting and all these different things as an industry,” he observes, suggesting that it’s now the right time for “generative AI to really take hold”, in order to help meet a number of challenges.

But he goes against the claims of key rivals, by talking down any “revolution” in the industry, with one eye instead on anxious clients suspicious of rising robotics in investment.

“The last place where technology will get applied is in the investments area,” he confirms. “The primary places will be in distribution and operating efficiency.”

Clients won’t begin to embrace digital investment technology until “it’s perfectly safe, sound, repeatable and clear,” he suggests. “We’re not going to take risks,” reflecting the “more conservative” attitude he has long recommended.

Despite being an instigator of digital transformation, Mr Schlossberg believes pundits who claim competition will come from ‘big techs’ of Silicon Valley and the Pearl River Delta, rather than BlackRock or Goldman Sachs in New York City, are running ahead of themselves.

When he laid down his highly conservative view at the recent IMpower FundForum in Monaco, observers noted the stark contrast to BNY Investments & Wealth boss Jose Minaya, who predicted industry changes during the next five years that will be “way more pronounced than what we saw in the previous 20”.

Rather than aping technology companies, fund houses must remember that “we’re investors first and foremost”, stresses Mr Schlossberg. “I think the technology, the way that investment insight is getting delivered to people is going through a change and evolution, but at the end of the day, you still have to be a good investor. And I don’t think that’s going to change in 10 years, 20 years or 30 years.”

Instead, he expects a more incremental evolution to redefine investment offerings, adapting an institutional “private market strategy” to a much broader, individual client base.

Anytime I hear that something’s going to change the outcome for everybody, I’m highly sceptical

“Anytime I hear that something’s going to change the outcome for everybody, I’m highly sceptical,” he confirms. “Just because we could put private market capabilities into vehicles for any kind of investor doesn’t mean it’s something that they all need. Sure, it’s going to democratise in time,” he says. “But this is just 5 to 10 per cent of people’s portfolios.” Currently, Invesco manages $130bn invested in private markets.

This evolution includes injecting much-needed vitality into Invesco’s range of exchange traded funds and index mandates, currently worth more than $900bn. “ETFs won’t just be passive delivery vehicles, they’ll be active,” he suggests. “I think that’s where the technology and innovation is going to come.”

Investment skill rather than technological prowess will still be the defining quality for leading firms, he predicts, flying in the face of deeply held beliefs that today’s products are all commoditised. “Not everything scales, quality still matters, and that’s important,” he stresses.

“This man really believes in investment basics, rather than bells and whistles, so he’s old school,” says Amin Rajan, head of the Create-Research consultancy. “But there is a danger that Invesco may get left behind in the AI arms race. There’s no doubt that they are a serious player in active management, but they’ve also got a big passive business, in which they are not making much headway. Where they are really scoring is in their ‘go anywhere’-type mandates, where they review their asset allocation every month or every quarter.”

Mr Schlossberg says he has favoured more of a slow-burning transformation, through encouraging a “collaborative culture” of a “big, local asset manager”.

There is no talk of using his reported $11m annual salary for setting up any impact investing charity or foundation to help change society. Instead, encouraging careful and wise investment remains the main priority. “I am focused on the stakeholders of Invesco, which for me, are the shareholders, our clients and our employees,” he says.

Despite the recent trend to back American exceptionalism, which captures the thinking of US competitors, Mr Schlossberg remains a strong believer in a multipolar world.

“Importantly, as an American, I’m US based, but thinking as a global investor,” he reveals. “You’re making sure you’re not just allocated to your home country, but to the rest of the world. That’s how I look at it over the long term.”

Importantly, as an American, I’m US based, but thinking as a global investor

Rather than the US-focused business strategy of some competitors, he hopes to eventually spread resources between key growth markets of India and China, alongside North American and European expansion.

“From an investment standpoint, the US and China are the two biggest economies in the world. I don’t see that changing in the next while. I think both are coming at it from a very different perspective. China has a lot of development needed to have a proper retirement market, a fully functioning capital market, and to become the world’s second largest economy. It’s got a 500 million person emerging middle class, which is woefully underserved by independent investors.”

At the end of the day, Mr Schlossberg values this long-term strategy ahead of disruption. “You could go back in time and look at lots of things where you’re either too slow or you weren’t looking,” he concedes. “But for me, it’s always been about finding that balance between making change and thinking about the long term.”