Carney appoints Blackrock exec to one of Canada's most top secret roles

Prime Minister Mark Carney is handing a secretive top government job to a BlackRock executive, appointing Glenn Purves as Canada’s deputy minister of international trade.

Source: Facebook

Prime Minister Mark Carney is handing a secretive top government job to a BlackRock executive, appointing Glenn Purves as Canada’s deputy minister of international trade.

BlackRock is an American multinational investment company and the world’s largest asset manager, with $12.5 trillion in assets under management as of last year.

Purves has been serving as the global head of macro research at the BlackRock Investment Institute since January of last year.

He has also worked for the International Monetary Fund.

Purves will replace Rob Stewart as deputy minister of international trade. Stewart has been moved to head up the creation of a new agency devoted to combating financial crime.

Purves has held several senior positions in the federal public service, spending roughly 12 years working for the government, including as assistant deputy minister at Finance Canada between 2021 and 2023.

Carney announced Purves’ appointment, along with 16 new individuals, in his latest shuffle of the public service’s senior ranks, slated to take effect in the coming weeks.

“These leadership changes support the strong, effective delivery of priorities and results for Canadians, while positioning the federal government to advance Canada’s interests and respond to the rapidly shifting dynamics of the global landscape,” wrote the prime minister in a release on Wednesday.

Carney also appointed several others from the private finance sector, including Royal Bank of Canada’s Doug Guzman, who will head a new defence investment agency.

The majority of new appointments, however, involve current deputy ministers moving to new departments. This includes David Angell, the foreign and defence policy adviser to the Prime Minister and the Privy Council Office, who is becoming associate deputy minister of Foreign Affairs.

Meanwhile, Kevin Brosseau, appointed to lead efforts to crack down on fentanyl, has been given an additional role as senior associate deputy minister of national defence.