State Street Global Advisors Names Global Head of Defined Contribution

Date: Thursday, June 10, 2010
Author: CHW

State Street Global Advisors (SSgA), the investment management business of State Street Corporation (NYSE: STT) today announced the appointment of Kristi Mitchem to senior managing director and global head of its defined contribution business.

In this new position Mitchem, 39, is responsible for advancing SSgA’s $252 billion global defined contribution business including product development, distribution, pricing, client service, operations and marketing activities. She will also work closely with SSgA’s offices and investment centers worldwide to build a competitive defined contribution offering that is tailored to meet regional and country-specific requirements. Mitchem reports to Jamie Kase, executive vice president and head of Global Sales and Marketing at State Street Global Advisors.

For 30 years State Street Global Advisors has worked with defined contribution plan sponsors to help create well-designed investment strategies along the risk/return spectrum at a low cost. Its investment vehicles aim to help retirement investors in achieving sufficient retirement savings through wealth accumulation and eventual replacement income.

“Defined contribution market growth is accelerating at a rapid pace and it’s critical to SSgA’s long term growth,” said Kase. “Plan sponsors and their participants face many challenges today including investment choices and the need for ongoing education to ensure sufficient retirement savings. Kristi is an industry veteran with an outstanding record who has been on the frontlines of building and delivering solutions to better serve the needs of retirement investors. We are pleased to have her on board and look forward to working with her to sharpen our focus on delivering innovative solutions to the DC market.”

Mitchem joins SSgA from BlackRock, where she most recently served as managing director and head of the US Defined Contribution business. Prior to this role, she was managing director and head of US Transition Services at Barclays Global Investors (BGI) where she was responsible for redirecting the transition services business and driving top line revenue growth. Before joining BGI in 2005, Mitchem worked at Goldman Sachs & Co for nine years in a variety of sales and trading roles. She holds a B.A. from Davidson College and an M.B.A. from Stanford University. She is also a former Fulbright Scholar.

“I am thrilled to join State Street Global Advisors,” said Mitchem. “SSgA’s long-standing heritage of partnering with and advising pension plan sponsors in all aspects of retirement plan management make them uniquely positioned to help retirement investors in an increasingly complex and competitive marketplace.”

State Street has a keen understanding of the trends driving the DC market and in March launched a Vision series thought leadership paper examining the current challenges facing defined contribution (DC) pension systems following the significant volatility in the global financial markets. Entitled “Pensions: Strengthening the DC Model for the Future,” the report assessed the relative strengths of global DC systems and details best practices across governance and design of pension plans.

About State Street Global Advisors

State Street Global Advisors, the investment management business of State Street Corporation (NYSE: STT), delivers investment strategies and integrated solutions to clients worldwide across every asset class, investment approach and style. With $1.9 trillion in assets under management at March 31, 2010, State Street Global Advisors has investment centers in Boston, Hong Kong, London, Montreal, Paris, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo, Toronto and Zurich, and offices in 27 cities worldwide. For more information, visit State Street Global Advisors at http://www.ssga.com.