Chief Investment Officer at African Development Bank - AfDB

Position Number: 50000923
Position Grade: PL3

The Complex

• The Vice Presidency for Finance oversees the financial management of the Bank Group. This encompasses the Bank Group’s treasury activities including borrowings from the capital markets and investment activities; controllership functions including financial reporting and loan administration; strategic resource mobilization and the strengthening of the non-statutory financial resources and instruments; the overall asset/liability management for the Bank Group.   

The Hiring Department

• The Treasury Department is responsible for raising funds from capital markets, managing and investing the Bank Group’s liquidity and shareholders’ funds, processing and settling all financial transactions and managing the institution’s banking relationships.

The Position

• The Chief Investment Officer will be responsible for managing multiple fixed income investment portfolios for several entities of the African Development Bank Group.

Key Functions
Under the supervision and guidance of the Division Manager, Investments, the Chief Investment Officer will perform the following:
Portfolio management:

• Leads the management the Bank Group's assets in its liquid currencies with the objective of capital preservation, profitability, and liquidity maintenance according to the investment guidelines of each specific entity by executing transactions in securities and derivatives such as swaps and futures; identify and execute investment and trading opportunities within risk parameters. The Chief Investment Officer is tasked with managing the largest and most complex portfolios.
• Manages the cash collateral portfolios by ensuring the investment of cash received as credit support in short-dated instruments with the objective of covering the financial costs.
• Leads the development of the Investment Process and the implementation of the Strategic Asset Allocation.
• Leads the Bank’s short-term funding strategy and its execution by issuing Commercial Paper (CPs) to cover short-term liquidity gaps, posting regular levels for CPs to increase the visibility of the Bank and assessing other alternative short-term funding options such as repo transactions.
• Leads the credit analysis process by ensuring that specific issuers/counterparties are assessed to ensure their creditworthiness.
• Leads the selection process for external portfolio managers; reviews external portfolio managers’ activities to ensure adequate management of the Bank’s assets by conducting regular meetings and reviewing performance reports.
• Leads key projects on innovation in investment products and strategies by submitting proposals to the Division Manager or evaluating proposals from other investment officers. The Chief Investment Officer is expected to lead multiple projects throughout their lifecycle: from their inception to Board approval and then follow up with their implementation.

Financial Policies:

• Contributes to the formulation and reviews the African Development Bank Group’s financial policies by making appropriate policy recommendation to Senior Management, the Board and Asset and Liability Committee; participates in the review of other financial policies including borrowing and currency management policies by providing feedback to proposals from other Divisions.
• Ensures that Process manuals of the Division are up-to-date by contributing to their periodic review.

Market Intelligence & Reporting:

• Monitors political, economic and market developments and assess their implication for the Bank's assets and investment strategy. Monitors Central Banks activities to assess developments in their monetary policies and their implication for interest rate trends and the formulation the investment strategy for the Bank's Investment Portfolio.
• Keeps Division Manager and Treasurer up-to-date on the investment strategy and developments in the financial markets by (i) providing regular updates at Strategy Meetings and through notes, (ii) responding to information requests from the Treasurer, Asset and Liability Committee, the Board, and the rest of the Bank, (iii) producing monthly and quarterly reports presenting performance results and market developments (iv) producing weekly economic and bond market reports prepared by the division.

Advisory & Capacity Building:

• Provides technical assistance to other divisions in areas of risk hedging, fixed income trading, and valuation of bonds and derivatives by reviewing reports produced by other divisions and responding to specific technical requests.  
• Provides advisory services and technical assistance to African Central Banks and other financial institutions on fixed income investment management, and risk hedging by responding to specific technical requests or reviewing proposals or policies.
• Designs courses and programs targeted at senior management, middle managers and officers of Central banks and other financial institutions.

External Relationship:

1. Maintains and manages professional relationships with the investment community, dealer counterparties, central banks and other professionals operating in financial markets, by providing responses to information requests, representing the Bank at conferences and contributing to the expansion of the list of existing Global Master Repurchase Agreement and International Swaps and Derivatives Association agreements. 

Analytics, Models and System Development:

• Leads the development of analytics tools in the team to improve the team’s capacity to capture and monitor risks; such improvements include the implementation of portfolio analytical tools, such as Profit & Loss (P&L) attribution analysis, cash flow projections analysis.
• Leads key system development projects designed to improve operational efficiency; Examples include the functional testing of the deployment of Straight-Through Processing and electronic trading platforms.

Competencies (Skills, Experience, and Knowledge)

• Hold at least a Master’s Degree in Finance, Economics, Mathematics, Statistics or another relevant quantitative discipline. Relevant professional certifications such as Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) or Financial Risk Manager (FRM) are highly desirable.
• Have a minimum of seven (7) years of relevant and practical experience in International Capital Markets with a strong emphasis on active management of complex fixed income portfolios, denominated in one of the following currencies: USD, EUR, GBP, JPY, RMB.  
• Demonstrated ability to set strategic direction for fixed income portfolio management, with a proven track record of developing and implementing innovative investment strategies. Experience in hedging financial risks and trading interest rate and currency derivatives, is essential.
• Strong knowledge across a wide range of asset management areas, including strategic asset allocation, Treasury instruments, structured products, Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) investing and local currency investing. Proven credit analysis and financial modelling skills; strong quantitative skills.
• Experience in exercising a related/similar function in another Multilateral Development Bank, Central Bank, investment bank or top tier asset management firm.
• Takes ownership for projects, establishing key deliverables and timelines, consistently following up with others to ensure target dates are met.
• Provides guidance to others in developing themselves within their area of expertise.
• Ability to communicate effectively (written and oral) in English or French, preferably with a working knowledge of the other language.
• Demonstrate a strong work ethic.
• Good knowledge of the use of standard software (Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint, and web tools); Excel VBA and Python programming skills are a plus.
• Practical experience with Bloomberg is required; Hands-on experience with Treasury systems such as Summit and MSCI BARRA is advantageous.