Merrill boss adds ex-colleagues

Merrill Lynch's new global foreign exchange chief, Stephen Kemp, has hired three former colleagues from Morgan Stanley, the bank he left last April to join Merrill, reports RiskNews' sister publication, FX Week .

Nick Crawford joins in a newly created position as managing director and co-head of global foreign exchange trading in New York. Working alongside existing London-based co-head of forex trading, Marcus Browning, he will report to Kemp, who was his boss at Morgan Stanley until April.

Also in New York, Tom Gormley joins as director and commodity trading adviser (CTA) sales dealer. He will report to Sue Evans, head of the bank's CTA desk in New York.

The third appointee is Tony Sofia, who joins the bank in London in July as a director and deputy chief spot trader, reporting to chief dealer Chris Allington.

The appointments reflect the bank's efforts to "continue to strengthen and grow [its] core foreign exchange franchise", said Kemp in an internal memo. "Each of these individuals brings tremendous expertise and market knowledge to their new role."

Crawford, Gormley and Sofia are not the only Morgan Stanley dealers to have joined Merrill since Kemp took over its global forex business from outgoing chief Michael deSa in June.

Alex Vanderlip has also joined Merrill as a forex sales dealer to private clients from Morgan Stanley in London, where he was also in sales.

The three latest additions have all worked at Morgan Stanley for a number of years. Crawford has worked there since 1998, when he joined to help establish the bank's emerging markets business. He had held his most recent role there, as a director and senior forex trader, since 1999. Prior to that, he spent four years at UBS in its emerging markets group.

Gormley had been an forex sales dealer at the investment bank's New York office since 2003. His appointment represents a return to Merrill, where he had worked as an forex trader from 1995 to 2003, based in both New York and Singapore.

Sofia had worked at Morgan since 1997, when he joined as a senior trader. He worked at the former Swiss Banking Corporation in Zurich from 1995 to 1997, and UBS in Geneva, Zurich and London between 1990 and 1995.

A spokesperson for Morgan Stanley in New York said the bank is seeking replacements for all four positions.