Jeff Peek appears confident and relaxed. It may have
something to do with his recent holiday to Florence and Rome - one
of his daughters is at school in Italy - but it's the day before
Merrill Lynch's first quarter results, which usually leaves
executives looking rather distracted. And it's been a rotten few
months for every part of the financial services industry, even
supposedly stable asset management, which Peek heads at Merrill
Lynch.
But Peek is looking forward to the results. True the volatility in
the markets may have led to a drop in assets under management, and
a consequent drop in income in the last quarter, but nothing
significantly worse than endured by any of its peers. Even the
announcement in March that joint chief operating officers Carol
Galley and Stephen Zimmerman - formerly the co-heads of Mercury
Asset Management before Merrill bought it in 1997 - are to retire
this year hardly caused...
