Adam Felesky, CEO and head of the Americas for Horizons ETFs Management (Canada) Inc. of Toronto and one of the company’s original founders, has unexpectedly departed the company. His duties have been assumed by Taeyong Lee, executive chairman, until a new CEO is appointed.

Horizons ETFs Management (Canada) Inc. has about $4.6 billion in assets under management and 72 ETFs listed on the TSX, making it one of the largest families of ETFs in Canada. Horizons ETFs is a member of Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. of Korea which acquired an 85% stake in the company in November 2011.

“Mirae wanted to move the company forward from a growth perspective,” says Steve Hawkins, senior executive vice president and chief investment officer, “and while Mirae had one vision, Adam had a different vision about how to move the company forward. As a result of those differences of opinion, Adam has departed the company.”

Lee serves as the president of global business unit at Mirae Asset Global Investments Co., Ltd., has been dividing his time between Korea, New York and Toronto, but will stay in Toronto while he is helping to guide the transition to a new management team. He previously served as the Global Head of ETFs at the firm. Hawkins says it is not known whether Horizons will conduct an executive search outside the firm.

“As one of the principal founders, Adam was instrumental in helping build Horizons ETFs as a leading ETF provider in Canada over the last decade,” said Lee in a release.

Hawkins says Felesky, who is just under 40 years of age, was the “driving force” of the company who guided the business strategy and product development.

Originally, Horizons ETFs started in 2005 as a Caribbean-based holding company with a limited family of three hedge funds and later became BetaPro Management Inc. of Toronto, when it became known for bringing leveraged and inverse ETFs to Canada.

Before launching the Horizons funds, Felesky worked in JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s derivatives group in New York, where he co-led the coverage for many of JPMorgan’s top tier corporate clients in the oil and gas and power and utility sectors. Previously, Felesky worked in investment banking for JPMorgan Canada and CIBC World Markets Inc.

He graduated from McMaster University of Hamilton, Ont., in 1999 with a Bachelor of Engineering and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science. Felesky is currently a member of the Ontario Securities Commission’s Investment Funds Product Advisory Committee and a member of the Young Presidents Organization (YPO).

Prior to the 2011 acquisition by Mirae, the majority owner of Horizons ETFs was Jovian Capital Corp. of Toronto, which bought control in 2006. In 2006, Howard Atkinson, the former head of business development for ETF-provider Barclays Global Investors Canada Ltd., now BlackRock Asset Management Canada Ltd., joined as executive vice president of BetaPro.

In 2007, the fund family launched its leveraged ETFs, allowing investors to double the daily returns of a variety of indices or commodities, from broad market averages to gold, oil and grains. These funds come in “bull” versions as well as “bear” or inverse versions that rise by double the amount of the daily loss in the underlying index or investment and remain part of the Horizons family. Other regular ETFs were later added, and in 2009, the AlphaPro division of Horizons launched the first actively managed ETFs in Canada.

Mirae Asset Global Investments is part of a Mirae Asset Financial Group, a global investment management firm with operations around the world, including Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Colombia, Hong Kong, India, Korea, Taiwan, the U.K., the United States and Vietnam. With US$64 billion in assets under management, it provides asset management services encompassing traditional equity and fixed income products, ETFs and alternative strategies such as real estate, private equity and hedge funds.