From Doctor to Emerging Market Equity Fund Manager – A German tale.

So in this conversation I am delighted to unravel an unconventional journey and welcome Dr Christina McGuire, CEO of Elephant Asset Management as our guest. We discuss her upbringing and German attitudes to finance, before touching upon her medical journey, her decision to go to Harvard Business school and then join Goldman Sachs.

She discusses working and investing in China, the skills taught and culture encouraged at Goldmans, before she explains her decision to go it alone. She describes the investment approach of her firm Elephant Asset Management, where she manages a concentrated, stock-specific, emerging market equity fund.

She explains her philosophy and style, detailing geographic, sectoral and company disciplines as well as the significant opportunities created by the post-Covid world for her domestically-focused companies.

She describes the due diligence process, the need to eye ball CEO and CFOs and why she believes company visits and sitting in the staff canteen of investing companies are great ways to gauge culture, and sense the mood. Christina also explains why the S&G in ESG are significantly more measurable in the countries in which she invests.

Finally Christina talks about how women should really think about asset management as a career, and offers some other great advice for young people thinking about their futures.