Firms & Funds

NYC hires former investment banker as senior private equity official

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AppleMark
  • David Enriquez spent four years in M&A at Rothschild
  • Also worked at Merrill Lynch
  • Not clear whether Enriquez has private equity experience

The New York City Comptroller’s office hired former investment banker J. David Enriquez as a senior investment officer on the private equity team, spokesman Eric Sumberg confirmed.

Update: The Comptroller also hired Jose Guzman as an investment officer on the private equity team. Guzman previously worked as an associate at Cerberus Capital Management.

Enriquez, who joined the Bureau of Asset Management within the Comptroller’s office, spent four years at Rothschild, first as a vice president and then as a director in the M&A group, according to his LinkedIn profile. He also worked for three years at Merrill Lynch in industrials investment banking, his profile said.

Enriquez also worked at Bear Stearns and Sullivan & Cromwell in M&A, his profile said.

It’s not clear if Enriquez has experience committing to private equity funds.

Enriquez and Guzman joined a small team that manages around $10.2 billion of private equity investments across the five city pension funds, according to the pension system’s website.

The Bureau of Asset Management, which oversees investments for the $154 billion New York City Public Pension Funds, promoted Alex Doñé in 2014 to lead private equity. Doñé was again promoted last year to lead the private markets portfolio that includes private equity, real estate and infrastructure.

Along with Doñé, Enriquez and Guzman, the private equity team includes Eneasz Kadziela. It’s not clear if there are any other members of the team.

Like many large public systems, New York City has worked to trim the number of manager relationships in its private equity portfolio. The system last year hired Greenhill Cogent to help organize and run a sale of as much as $1 billion of the private equity portfolio. After almost a year, however, no portfolio has yet come to market. It’s unclear whether the sale has been delayed.

Action Item: Check out NYC’s pension asset allocation breakdown here: http://on.nyc.gov/1iRqm4p

Photo courtesy of Reuters/Brendan McDermid