CITY MOVES Who’s switching jobs
RBC Capital Markets
The corporate and investment banking arm of the Royal Bank of Canada has hired Phil Halper as a director in its Scandinavian rates trading team, based in London.
Halper joins the firm with 15 years of market experience, having most recently worked at the Royal Bank of Scotland, where he was a senior trader.
In his new role, he will focus primarily on the Norwegian market.
Hermes Fund Managers
The asset management firm has appointed Neil Williams to its fixed income team as chief economist.
Williams, who will be tasked with providing economic analysis to the fixed income portfolio managers, began his career at the Confederation of British Industry (CBI).
He has since held positions as head of emerging markets research at stockbroker Paine Webber and head of sovereign research and strategy at Japanese securities firm Mizuho International.
Meningitis Trust
Former Merrill Lynch managing director Alastair Irvine has joined the board of trustees for the UK’s longest-established meningitis charity.
Irvine, who was previously a stockbroker for over 20 years before joining Merrill Lynch, contracted the deadly disease himself as a four-year-old and was left with hearing difficulties.
“I am lucky compared with the after-effects some people have to live with, but meningitis completely changed my life. I now have three children and, as a parent, I know how frightening this disease is,” said Irvine, who is now an independent consultant.
Brookfield Asset Management
The asset manager has appointed Peter Thomson, Robert von Herrman, Paul Tam, Alexander Apponyi and Scott White to its private equity funds group.
Thomson, von Herrman and Tam, who were all previously managing directors at Bear Stearns, will be responsible for covering the UK and the Middle East, the German-speaking countries and Asia respectively.
Apponyi will cover Scandinavian and Benelux countries, having joined from BerchWood Partners, while White will be responsible for deal execution and project management and joins from Citi Alternative Investments.
Essenden
The leisure firm has appointed Nick Basing, 47, as its new chief executive.
Basing was previously responsible for the turnaround of Paramount Holdings, including the restaurant chains Chez Gerard, Bertorelli and Caffe Uno, where he was chief executive for six years. Prior to that, he worked in a variety of management positions with Rank, First Leisure, Unilever and Granada television.
Osmosis Capital
The specialist asset manager, which focuses on low carbon investment, has appointed Gerrit Heyns as a partner.
An investment banker with over 22 years of experience, Heyns spent the past seven years at Russian bank Troika Dialog as global head of equity sales.