Investment research house van Eyk Research has confirmed it has had more executive changes at a senior level.
The group has appointed former Standard & Poor’s (S&P) researcher John O’Brien as head of research, replacing longstanding van Eyk staffer Nigel Douglas, who left to join Perpetual Private Wealth earlier this year. Douglas replaced van Eyk Research co-founder Stephen van Eyk as head of research following his departure from the group last year.
At the time of Douglas’ departure, the research house pointed to senior analyst John Wong and the head of the strategic research unit, Nigel Wilkin-Smith, as the leaders of its two research teams — the larger investment research unit under Wong in an acting capacity and the smaller strategic research unit under Wilkin Smith. The group has now confirmed Wilkin Smith’s departure from the group, with Wilkin-Smith taking up a role with the Future Fund.
The group’s new head of research, O’Brien, transferred to Australia from S&P’s New York office in 2007, having worked with S&P since 1998. O’Brien’s experience since coming to Australia includes time at ANZ as director, research and analysis, financial institutions group.
According to a statement from van Eyk Research, while with S&P in the US O’Brien designed and implemented financial models for asset-backed securities and published research papers on structured investments.
The group has also appointed James Armstrong as an analyst in its investment research team. Armstrong spent the last three years at Westpac as a fund credit analyst, prior to which he worked at Macquarie Bank.
A recent recruit to the strategic research unit was former QIC quantitative analyst Dr Stephen Garner, who is now a senior investment analyst for van Eyk. Garner’s background is in academic research, and he specialises in technical software development and data analysis, with particular experience in the minerals exploration and mining industries.
Appointments at van Eyk Research are critical to the financial advice industry, with more than 50 per cent of advisers relying on the group’s research to shape investment decisions on behalf of their clients. The group estimates these decisions could potentially impact more than $200 billion of clients’ funds.
van Eyk Research co-founder and former chief executive Stephen van Eyk is yet to commit to a new venture.
