ZURICH (Reuters), – Pictet, a Swiss wealth manager and asset manager, has appointed Edmund Buckley as head of its Direct Private Equity division to help it expand its alternative investments business. It announced this on Friday.

Buckley is an ex-manager at THI Investments private equity company and will be expected to expand the direct investment in businesses.

Buckley was Elif Aktub’s first major appointment. He heads Pictet Alternative Advisors division. Elif joined Pictet as one of its eight managing partners in September.

Pictet has a number of key growth areas in alternative investments. End 2021 client assets were 32 billion Swiss Francs (32.56 Billion USD) in hedge funds and private equity.

Pictet owned assets totalling 698 billion francs under custody or management at that point.

Andreas Klein will be the head of Private Debt. This job was also recently created, according to a spokesperson.

Privative debt has become more competitive with bank loans. Klein worked previously at Intermediate Capital Group. Alternative investments should grow at a faster rate than traditional bonds and stocks.

Boston Consulting Group predicts that the assets under management will reach $22 trillion by 2025, up from $15 Trillion in 2020.

This trend is also being followed by other major asset managers like BlackRock (NYSE :).

($1 = 0.9828 Swiss francs)