NPS fund management taps former GEPS CIO Seo as new chief

National Pension Service (NPS) of South Korea, the world's third-largest pension fund, has tapped Seo Won-joo as the new chief investment officer, according to sources on Dec. 27. 

Seo served as the CIO of Government Employees Pension Service (GEPS) of Korea for three years from May 2019. At NPS, The his term is two years and can be extended on a yearly basis depending on fund management performance.

His experiences as an ex-CIO of GEPS and overseas investment track records were highly valued by the NPS' committee which recommends c-suite executive candidates to the health and welfare minister, sources said. Seo is also known for focusing on the global macroeconomic trends and conducting brief daily meetings on economic analysis while in GEPS.

Born in 1966, Seo holds a master's degree in business administration at Yonsei University. He started his financial career at Samsung Life Insurance Co. in 1988 and has been a head the at the insurer’s New York and Singapore offices.

Seo also was CIO of now-defunct PCA Life Insurance, which was fully acquired by Mirae Asset Life Insurance Co. in 2018, for four years since 2014.

Under his leadership, GEPS posted 9.6%, 11.4% and 9.7% of returns on investment in 2019, 2020 and 2021, respectively.

NPS' recent worsening performance is a burden for the new CIO. The pension fund had a cumulative loss of 7.1% on investment, or 68 trillion won ($53.6 billion), between January and September of this year. The pension fund's assets under management fell to 896.6 trillion won as of end-September.

Write to Jun-Ho Cha at chacha@hankyung.com
Jihyun Kim edited this article.