Ivanishvili’s assistant says his ‘investment manager’ title is nothing more than a label

ALTHOUGH he was appointed an “investment manager” to some of ex-Georgian prime minister Bidzina Ivanishvili’s trust assets, this was nothing more than a label, Ivanishvili’s assistant George Bachiashvili said on Friday (Sep 9).

“Often at banks and many professional institutions, you have these titles that don’t really reflect what they do. Like in investment banks, you have thousands of vice-presidents and directors… Therefore it could be a title ‘investment manager’, but it wouldn’t mean much,” he testified to the Singapore International Commercial Court.

“Even in my fund, I had various types of managers, but they would just be titles,” said Bachiashvili, who was deputy chief executive of a Georgia state-owned investment fund when he first met the billionaire in 2012.