Head of the BlackRock Hedge Fund Platform, Co-Head of Fundamental Equities and Deputy Head of the Portfolio Management Group
Philip Vasan, Managing Director, is Head of BlackRock Hedge Funds (BHF) representing the firm’s direct hedge fund business; he is Global Co-Head of Fundamental Equities, jointly responsible for fundamental active equity investing across regions, sectors and strategies; and Deputy Head of the Portfolio Management Group (PMG), which encompasses BlackRock’s active investing across asset classes. He also has responsibility for PMG Sustainability implementation.
Mr. Vasan co-chairs the Fundamental Equities Executive Committee and is a member of the Firm’s Global Operating Committee and GEC Investment Sub-Committee.
Prior to this, Mr. Vasan led Global Lending, Liquidity, Financing and Balance Sheet, and before that led Investments and Portfolio Solutions for BlackRock U.S. Wealth Advisory.
Before joining BlackRock in 2016, Mr. Vasan was with Credit Suisse in global leadership positions as a member of the Management Committees of the Private Bank and Investment Bank. He served as CEO of Private Banking in the Americas, and prior to that developed and led Prime Services to a top-two global position with hedge funds. There he promoted industry adoption of the multi-prime brokerage model now widely used by hedge funds. Mr. Vasan served as worldwide Head of Equity Derivatives and Convertibles, Program Trading and Proprietary Arbitrage Trading. As Head of Global Foreign Exchange, he worked with competitors to jointly launch the market’s first online trading platform for clients, FXall, which was later bought by Thomson Reuters. Mr. Vasan also directed the bank’s e-Commerce investments.
Mr. Vasan received his B.A. with High Honors from Oberlin College, and his Ph.D. in Economics from Harvard University, where he was named top graduate instructor in the University. He has authored a text on Options, has served as a visiting lecturer in Finance at the MIT Sloan School of Management, and has lectured at the Wharton School of Business. He has served on the Investment Committee for the Oberlin College Endowment and is a former Director of the Managed Funds Association, which represents the global hedge fund industry and its investors to advocate for sound industry practices and public policies. Mr. Vasan is currently Vice Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the East Harlem School in New York City.
