Managers To Watch: JPMAM's Malcolm Smith on how solutions, not star managers, will drive the industry

Head of European equity group

With two sisters in the industry, it is not surprising that JPMAM's head of European equity group Malcolm Smith ended up in asset management.

But it was his father, a potato merchant based in Scotland, who first got him thinking about how markets operate.  "Even though he worked in a niche area, he was always thinking about how markets might affect him. You can learn a huge amount about what to consider during the highs and lows and how to interact with people from watching someone run a small business," Smith explained.  As his curiosity about the world economy grew stronger, Smith landed his first job at Merrill Lynch IM as an assistant to the firm's retail investment director.  He said: "One of my responsibilities was...