The long rumored divestiture of Frank Russell by Northwestern Mutual was completed with the announcement of a sale to the London Stock Exchange. The sale was reported to be for $2.7 billion. Experts speculated that for LSE, Russell’s index business, second only to S&P and slightly ahead of MSCI, was the key — although they do also pick up a mere $257 billion in assets.
Located in Seattle and founded in 1936, Russell is a well-known and respected asset manager and industry thought leader with deep ties to the retirement market, although it’s stronger with institutional and DB clients. Dick Davies, who headed their DC institutional business, left recently to return to Alliance Bernstein. Their DCIO effort is now led by Andrew Scherer, who was hired within the last year after a long career at Van Kampen and then its buyer, Invesco.
Given their rather modest DCIO business, it’s doubtful that the DC market was instrumental in the acquisition, although it could give Russell some additional capital to build out the business.
