Active war

1 May 2017 By Tom Buerkle

The firing of CEO Peter Kraus is the latest wakeup call for Wall Street stock pickers. Diversification efforts at the AXA-controlled firm failed to offset a long decline in its once-potent equities business. The upheaval suggests other active managers also have nowhere to hide.

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AllianceBernstein said on May 1 that it had appointed Robert Zoellick as chairman and Seth Bernstein as chief executive to replace Peter Kraus, who held both positions.

Denis Duverne, chairman of controlling shareholder AXA, said the change did not reflect any dissatisfaction with the course pursued by Kraus, who diversified the traditional stock- and bond-picking fund manager into alternative and multi-asset strategies.

“We felt it was appropriate to have a new leadership and face the accelerated pace of change that the industry is facing now,” he said. AXA, the French insurance company, owns 64 percent of AllianceBernstein, which also added Barbara Fallon-Walsh, Daniel Kaye and Ramon de Oliveira to the board.

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