NEW YORK (Reuters) - Jeffrey Gundlach, head of the bond firm DoubleLine, on Friday told Reuters that fellow bond maven Bill Gross called him Thursday evening to tell him that he was leaving Pimco, the investment firm Gross founded more than 40 years ago.
Gross, who quit Pimco on Friday to join Janus Capital Group, met with Gundlach last week at Gundlach's home in Los Angeles to discuss whether Gross might join Gundlach's firm, Gundlach said in an interview.
While skeptical at first about the approach by Gross, Gundlach said by the end of their meeting he thought "we had a lot in common."
Gross then called Gundlach Thursday evening and left a voicemail message explaining that he was leaving Pimco for another firm and would not be joining DoubleLine.
Gundlach said he believes Gross will perform better at Janus than he did recently at Pimco because he "isn't managing a lot of money."
At Pimco, Gross managed the Pimco Total Return Fund, the world's largest bond fund with more than $220 billion in assets, and its performance had lagged its peers and the wider bond market for over a year. At Janus, where he starts on Monday, Gross will takeover a fund that was only launched in May and has just $13 million in assets.
(Reporting by Jennifer Ablan; Writing by Dan Burns)