After the initial shock following the announcement in March
that both Carol Galley and Stephen Zimmerman were to retire this
year, it turns out that very little has changed.
Peter Gibbs is the new public face of Merrill Lynch Investment
Managers in Europe following his promotion to sole global chief
operating officer, a role his former bosses shared. But he has been
head of the Europe, Middle East and Africa region since late 1999,
as well as being co-head of global equities since 1996, so already
has hands-on control of investments and organization.
His promotion marks the symbolic end of a difficult five-year
period for the old Mercury Asset Management. Along with its new
brethren in Princeton, Mercury was enduring a period of poor
investment performance in the mid- to late-1990s, capped by
Unilever's decision to take the company to court with the
accusation of poorly managing its pension funds. The case...
