Goldman restructures credit derivatives sales

Goldman Sachs has restructured its North American credit derivatives sales team to focus on its 40 largest clients.

Based in New York, the specialist sales team will target three of its most active buyers of credit derivatives: reinsurers, hedge funds and banks.

The three heads of these teams will report to Eric Oberg, managing director and head of Goldman Sachs’ North American credit derivatives sales and marketing group. Oberg will also oversee a general sales and marketing team for Goldman Sachs’ other credit derivatives clients.

Previously, the bank had split its credit derivatives sales into four silos: single names, portfolio of names, structured credit trading business, and structured transactions business. “The main benefit of the new approach is that we can now speak with one voice to deliver all the credit derivatives products to our major clients,” said Oberg. “Each of these clients has specific issues or strategies that require more specialised dialogue.”

Goldman has hired Guillaume Malle from Credit Suisse First Boston to head the reinsurance sales division. He will work with Mark Retik, senior strategist for the reinsurance unit.

Lauren Franklin and Mark Rose will co-head the group’s hedge fund sales team. Both are internal promotions. Meanwhile, Bridget Fraser and Lindsay LoBue will co-lead Goldman Sachs’ banking sales team. Fraser joined Goldman in January from Enron and LoBue spent the past six years in JP Morgan’s credit derivatives sales team.