(Yicai) Sept. 22 -- China Asset Management, the country’s third biggest public fund manager, has appointed the chairman of its biggest shareholder CITIC Securities as its new top executive.

Zhang Youjun is replacing Yang Minghui, who held the position of chair for almost a decade and is leaving the company for professional reasons, Beijing-based ChinaAMC said yesterday. 58-year-old Zhang took up his post on Sept. 20. No further details were given of Yang’s future plans.

Zhang has been with CITIC Securities, which owns a 62.2 percent stake in ChinaAMC, since its inception in 1995, rising to the rank of chairman in 2016. He also served as assistant to the general manager of CITIC Group, the parent company of CITIC Securities. Zhang has worked for fund managers before and was the general manager of Changsheng Fund from 1998 to 2001.

As China’s fund industry grows rapidly, there have been an increasing number of changes in senior management. Since the beginning of this year, 260 senior executives in the sector have changed positions, involving 104 firms, according to Wind statistics. This is an indication of the fierce competition between companies for high-end talent.

Yang presided over a more than doubling of net profit at ChinaAMC in the decade that he was in charge to CNY2.2 billion (USD302 million) in 2022, and an almost two-and-a-half-fold jump in revenue to CNY7.4 billion.

As one of China’s biggest fund families, ChinaAMC managed CNY1.2 trillion (USD164 billion) of assets involving 395 fund products as of June 30, behind only E Fund Management and GF Fund Management.

The chairperson of a fund manager is usually appointed by the majority shareholder, as that person is responsible for the direction of the company’s development, an industry insider told Yicai. Other members of senior management, such as the general manager, tend to be recruited from the market.

Editor: Kim Taylor