Dual impact through the ownership structure

In 2005, Jonathan Thomas left his job as global chief operating officer at Morgan Stanley to take on the job as CEO of American Century Investments. The move also meant leaving New York for Kansas City. “Both me and my wife are from the Midwest and coming back was inspiring. What really attracted me to American Century, however, was the unique ownership model where more than 40 per cent of the profits go to our controlling owner, the Stowers Institute for Medical Research, in the form of dividends,” says Jonathan Thomas, adding that those dividends have totalled more than USD 1,8 billion since 2000.

The ownership structure was already in place when Jonathan Thomas came on board but he soon realised that employees were generally unaware of it. He also met some resistance when wanting to highlight the ownership structure in meetings with investors and consultants as many saw it as adding confusion to the established narrative of being a privately-owned, pure play asset manager focused on delivering superior risk-adjusted returns. “The management team had convinced themselves that no one wanted to hear this story but I still thought it was something special,” Jonathan Thomas says. “I still wanted to tell the ownership story