Merrill Lynch rebuilding equities team

Merrill Lynch Investment Management (MLIM) has recruited two senior analysts from ,Goldman Sachs JB Were (GSJBW) weeks after losing three of its Australian equities portfolio managers to a Challenger Financial Services-backed start-up boutique.

MLIM managing director Maurice O’Shannassy said senior Australian equities analysts Lou Capparelli and Kylie Nuske had been approached to join the team “due to their proven research and stock picking skills, and, importantly, their cultural fit within the team”, which he said the pair developed by working closely with the MLIM equity team during their careers at GSJBW.

O’Shannassy said MLIM did not intend to make changes to its investment process following the appointments.

“We remain committed to our team-based approach to managing our investment portfolios. The nature of our investment process is such that we believe long—term investment fundamentals are imperative,” he said.

Capparelli and Nuske will join the head of MLIM’s equities team Mark Himpoo, who remained with the fund manager when senior portfolio managers David Pace and Matthew Ryland and manager Marc Hester left to join the 25 per cent Challenger-owned boutique.

MLIM’s loss of Pace, Ryland and Hester from its seven-strong local team caused concern amongst research houses and led to ‘on hold’ ratings.

A spokesman from Morningstar, which has the fund ‘on hold’, said the research house had yet to receive communications from MLIM regarding the appointments, but expected the manager’s Australian equities funds to remain ‘on hold’ until the research house had completed its upcoming review of the Australian equities sector.

Standard & Poor’s is also yet to lift its ‘on hold’ rating.

S&P Fund analyst Marcus Hanel said the rating would be reconsidered following a meeting with MLIM during its full sector review.

Hanel said Capparelli and Nuske had not been directly involved in the management of the GSJBW Australian share fund and their departure would have no impact on the ratings of that manager.

At the time the ‘on hold’ rating was instituted, Hanel said the staff losses came at a bad time for MLIM following the announcement of its merger with BlackRock two months before.

“It is also unfortunate given the recent strong performance of the Australian Share Fund over the past 12 months, following a long period of poor performance and other staff departures,” he said at that time.