Masters in Business

BNY's Jose Minaya on How AI Is Transforming Asset Management

October 3, 2025

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  • Jose Minaya's career progression was characterized by a willingness to take on new, challenging areas outside his immediate expertise, such as moving from private credit to building the farmland investment platform at Nuveen. 
  • The shift in asset management focus is moving beyond security selection and cost competition toward delivering specific client outcomes, where technology and access to diverse capabilities (like alternatives) are crucial differentiators. 
  • BNY Mellon's significant scale and platform operating model, which integrates asset management, wealth, custody, and technology (like Archer and tokenization efforts), provide a substantial competitive advantage in the evolving industry landscape. 
  • Jose Minaya, Global Head of BNY Investments and Wealth managing $2.2 trillion, was the featured guest on this episode of Masters in Business. 
  • The host, Barry Ritholtz, promoted his new book, "How Not to Invest: The Ideas, Numbers, and Behaviors That Destroy Wealth and How to Avoid Them." 
  • The episode concludes with acknowledgments for the production team, including producers Alexis Noriega and Anna Luke, researcher Sean Russo, and Head of Podcasts Sage Bauman, before airing advertisements. 

Segments

Jose Minaya’s Early Career Path
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(00:03:30)
  • Key Takeaway: Minaya initially pursued professional baseball before pivoting to finance, driven by a ‘work in progress’ career plan and strong family work ethic.
  • Summary: Minaya grew up in Washington Heights to a Dominican family and initially aimed to be a professional baseball pitcher, but his career path shifted after college. He earned a finance degree from Manhattan College and an MBA from Tuck Business School, starting his career on Wall Street at JPMorgan. His transition to the buy-side, starting at AIG Global Investment Group (now Pine Bridge), was motivated by a preference for cash flow analysis over equity modeling.
Building Alternative Investment Platforms
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(00:07:26)
  • Key Takeaway: Minaya found his passion in building capabilities, exemplified by successfully launching and scaling a global farmland institutional management fund from scratch.
  • Summary: A key philosophy for Minaya is knowing what one does not know, which led him to hire experts when expanding into new areas like agriculture and commodities. He left a $15 billion private credit portfolio role to build a farmland fund, eventually becoming the largest institutional manager in that space globally. This success in building platforms led to expanded responsibilities across real estate, natural resources, and ultimately the CIO role at TIAA/Nuveen.
Longevity and Growth at Nuveen
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(00:10:22)
  • Key Takeaway: Minaya remained at Nuveen for 20 years because the firm consistently provided opportunities to build new teams and grow capabilities, culminating in his CEO role.
  • Summary: The search for passion led Minaya to Nuveen (part of TIAA), where he stayed for two decades, finding engagement through continuous new challenges. He highlights building the private credit platform, starting the Churchill group from zero to nearly $100 billion in the broader platform, as a key achievement. His real passion was found not just in investing, but in managing teams and building new organizational capabilities.
The Urgency of Alternatives
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(00:13:17)
  • Key Takeaway: The academic argument for alternatives (diversification, inflation protection) has transformed into an urgent necessity for investors following recent market volatility.
  • Summary: Alternatives historically offered diversification and yield, acting as a hedge against inflation and volatility, with illiquidity providing alpha due to lack of access. The conversation has shifted from academic discussion to urgency, especially after 2022 when stocks and bonds both declined double digits. The new portfolio construction paradigm is moving beyond 60/40 toward structures like 50-30-20, emphasizing outcomes over simple asset allocation buckets.
BNY’s Scale and Technological Edge
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(00:21:06)
  • Key Takeaway: BNY Mellon’s massive scale, touching one-fifth of global investable assets, provides a home-field advantage for investing in and leveraging disruptive technologies like AI and tokenization.
  • Summary: BNY, the oldest bank in America, manages $2.2 trillion in assets and services approximately $55 trillion globally through custody and infrastructure. Tokenization is primarily about creating liquidity, moving settlement from T+1 to near-instantaneous settlement (T+0), which saves institutions significant capital that would otherwise be tied up during clearing. The firm’s ability to invest hundreds of millions in AI requires significant scale, which BNY possesses, attracting top engineering talent.
BNY’s Platform Operating Model
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(00:32:38)
  • Key Takeaway: BNY’s success stems from its platform operating model, which connects previously siloed divisions like asset management, wealth, Pershing (advisors), and asset servicing.
  • Summary: BNY Investments manages $2 trillion, while the wealth platform manages $350 billion, and the firm also owns Pershing, which services nearly $3 trillion in advisor capital. This connectivity allows for cross-selling and leveraging internal technology, such as the Archer platform for separately managed accounts (SMAs), which BNY’s own asset management and wealth arms utilize as clients.
Investment Philosophy and Market Risks
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(00:48:56)
  • Key Takeaway: Despite strong current economic fundamentals (strong earnings, solid household balance sheets), the market faces an all-time high of potential geopolitical and policy risks.
  • Summary: Minaya predicted risk assets would rise early in the year because fundamentals supported it, arguing that investors should be structured for outcomes rather than being entirely risk-off. He notes that while the economy looks constructive, there is an unprecedented list of potential disruptions, including geopolitical issues and policy mistakes. A core investment principle is filtering out the 80% of market information that is noise to focus only on the 20% that truly matters.
Advice for New Investors
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(00:59:50)
  • Key Takeaway: New entrants into investing should focus on mastering the fundamentals by executing small, easy tasks exceptionally well, as this builds trust and demonstrates reliability.
  • Summary: Minaya advises recent graduates to do the ’easy things really well’ early in their careers, such as handling administrative tasks flawlessly, before expecting to work on major deals. He wishes he had better internalized the need to take emotion off the table and remain objective, recognizing what truly matters versus the surrounding noise.
Guest Wrap-up and Thanks
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(01:01:47)
  • Key Takeaway: Jose Minaya is the Global Head of BNY Investments and Wealth, overseeing $2.2 trillion.
  • Summary: Jose Minaya, Global Head of BNY Investments and Wealth, is confirmed to manage $2.2 trillion in assets. The host encourages listeners to explore over 550 previous episodes available on major podcast platforms. Listeners are also directed to find the host’s new book, “How Not to Invest,” at booksellers.
Production Team Acknowledgement
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(01:02:25)
  • Key Takeaway: The production team for Masters in Business includes specific named individuals for key roles.
  • Summary: The production team responsible for the weekly conversations includes Alexis Noriega and Anna Luke as producers, and Sean Russo as the researcher. Sage Bauman serves as the Head of Podcasts at Bloomberg. The host identifies himself as Barry Ritholtz.
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(01:03:03)
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(01:03:28)
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(01:03:59)
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