Fidelity to Beef Up Institutional Money in Plan to Double to $2 Trillion

Fidelity Investments is long used to being at the top of the ladder of success. However, the nation's No. 1 mutual fund company always sees room for improvement, especially when it comes down to money management for large institutions, an area where Fidelity could really use some improvement.

With a total of $1 trillion in assets under management and, of that, approximately $80 billion in stocks, Fidelity is now working on upping its institutional assets under management by setting up an asset management service that will provide administrative/management services for the equity accounts of large institutional investors, such as pension funds.

Peter J. Smail, who has been employed at Fidelity for 18 years now, has been chosen to run the new division, which will start off based in Boston and then move to Rhode Island. Prior to his appointment, Smail was responsible for launching and overseeing Fidelity's 401(k) division.

The Fidelity Mutual Fund Group will handle hiring for Pyramis. Already, Robert J. Haber, who manages Fidelity's best-performing large-cap mutual fund, and the $80 million Fidelity Focused Stock Fund, has been appointed to serve as CIO at Pyramis. Calls to Haber were not returned in time for press time.

Fidelity's goal here is to double its AUM to over $2 trillion within 10 years, as per Chairman Edward C. Johnson.