Top Abu Dhabi Wealth Fund Closes Latin America Equities Team

Bloomberg — The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority has shut down a team investing in Latin American equities, as part of efforts to focus on higher-growth areas, according to people familiar with the matter.

ADIA, the world’s third-largest sovereign wealth fund, made the decision to terminate the internally-managed Latin America mandate at the end of March, the people said. The move affects seven portfolio managers, two of whom will stay on at ADIA in different roles, the people said.

Abu Dhabi’s rainy-day fund still retains some of its Latin America public equities exposure but through externally-managed mandates that also include Mexico and the Andean region, the people said, asking not to be named because the information is confidential.

ADIA declined to comment.

In recent years, ADIA has made a number of internal changes to the way it invests and operates -- the fund closed its Japan equities desk in 2020 and last year overhauled its real estate division.

The Latin America team, led by former HSBC Asset Management executive Eduardo Favrin, was part of ADIA’s equities department that was created in 2020 by merging the fund’s internal and external equities teams. Favrin was appointed head of the Latin America portfolio in 2012.

The sovereign wealth fund is estimated to hold over $800 billion in assets, according to advisory firm Global SWF. Over the past two years, ADIA has hired dozens of people with backgrounds in science and mathematics to bolster its in-house expertise in areas such as artificial intelligence and machine learning.

ADIA was set up in 1976 to invest the surplus oil revenues of Abu Dhabi, one of the world’s largest crude exporters. It employs 1,680 people, according to its most recent annual review.