Mr Pohl, who stepped down as managing director of Hyperion Asset Management in 2012, established boutique Australian equities office ECP Asset Management in Sydney earlier this month.
Speaking to InvestorDaily, Mr Pohl said ECP AM is going into the institutional space “hammer and tongs” following the expiry of the restraint imposed upon Mr Pohl by Hyperion in January.
Mr Pohl said it usually takes two months to a year to bring in the initial mandates – but his track record at Hyperion and the fact that he manages $200 million for around 50 high net worth investors should help his cause.
“We’ve pitched to a couple of investment committees. I’m hoping by June – but that these things always take longer than you expect – that we’ll announce ‘X’ dollars from ‘Z’ super fund,” he said.
He admitted that it was a "tough gig" getting through the various gatekeepers in the industry – from super fund committees to the asset consultants.
“The gatekeepers want to see the entities and the people in place for a period of time. And that is usually three to five years,” said Mr Pohl.
For a boutique manager that is a “new guy on the block”, a small mandate may be granted in order for the manager to prove themselves, he said.
“But the real serious money only comes in after the three- to five-year period – then you get the tick from everybody,” said Mr Pohl.
“People in the industry know me, so I think we’ll get two to three mandates. Then everybody will wait and see,” he said.
There is a bias against smaller Australian equity managers, with the market viewing them as “incompetent”, according to Mr Pohl.
“They’d rather give the money to the big names in the US than give it to an [Australian firm],” he said.
If I was Joe Bloggs starting again ... you need a mandate or two from somebody, otherwise you just don’t get a look-in. You just don’t. And you could be as talented as all-hell,” said Mr Pohl.
