Norwegian hedge fund manager and philanthropist Nicolai Tangen finally takes over management of the country’s huge sovereign wealth fund after a fraught selection process. ©NTB Scanpix/AFP Håkon Mosvold Larsen

Oslo (AFP) – His new job is going to cost him a pretty penny but he’s okay with that — Nicolai Tangen on Tuesday takes over the reins of Norway’s $1 trillion sovereign wealth fund after months of drama.

From the hedge fund he started in London 15 years ago that made him a very wealthy man to the world’s biggest sovereign wealth fund, Tangen is transitioning between two very similar and yet very different worlds.

It’s a journey that has not been entirely smooth.

As soon as Norway’s central bank announced in March that it was hiring the AKO Capital hedge fund founder to replace Yngve Slyngstad as the manager of Norwegians’ national piggy bank, allegations of conflicts of interest and offshore tax havens hit the headlines.

His recruitment surprised many. To begin with, his name was not on the official list of applicants. The 54-year-old investor and philanthropist had to be headhunted and persuaded to move back to Norway.

Yet many are convinced that Tangen is the perfect man for the job.

“He’s clearly the best candidate,” said Oystein Olsen, the governor of the central bank which oversees a fund invested in more than 9,000 companies worldwide, as well as bonds and real estate.

Tangen’s background as a stock market speculator, his sizeable fortune and his socialising with VIPs have however worked against him.

In egalitarian Norway, the widely-accepted code of conduct — known as “Janteloven”, written by a Danish-Norwegian author in the 20th century — states simply: “Don’t think you’re better than anyone else.”

Olsen has also seen his reputation tarnished over Tangen’s recruitment, accused of irregularities in the hiring process.

Editorialists, MPs and lawyers have called for both men to go, until a last-minute arrangement was found last week that appears to have appeased the most vocal opponents.

In a renegotiation of his contract, Tangen accepted to transfer “forever” the 43 percent he still held in AKO Capital to his AKO Foundation charity, to alleviate concerns about possible conflicts of interest.

The foundation, created in 2013, supports causes that improve education, promote the arts and mitigate climate problems.

Tangen, who holds an art history degree among his many academic merits, reportedly owns one of the biggest collections of modern Scandinavian art.

– From his own pocket –

To silence critics, he has also agreed to sell personal investments worth some five billion kroner (470 million euros, $571 million) and deposit the proceeds in bank savings accounts, where he already has around two billion kroner saved.

This solution means he will have to pay more wealth tax than what he earns in annual salary — 6.65 million kroner (635,000 euros, $760,000) — and interest, with banks’ interest rates currently hovering around zero.

“It’s hard to accuse him of doing this out of greed,” said Sparebank 1 Markets chief analyst Pal Ringholm.

“There must be something else motivating him,” he told financial news website e24.no.

“I accepted the job because I think it’s the most important and exciting thing there is when you work in finance,” Tangen said.

The controversy surrounding his appointment does not seem to have fazed him one bit.

“It never crossed my mind to withdraw,” he told reporters last week.

With a twinkle in his eye, he said he had even offered to governor Olsen to deposit all his billions in Norges Bank — clearly a joke as the central bank does not accept deposits from private people.

Tangen seems to have a healthy dose of humour, moreover.

Asked whether he was angry about finding himself in the middle of a controversy over a job he had to be persuaded to accept, he quipped: “Angry? No. But I think Oystein owes me at least a beer”.

Disclaimer: Validity of the above story is for 7 Days from original date of publishing. Source: AFP.