Merrill Lynch has tweaked its European structuring group, dividing it into equity, fund and tax-linked structuring under Alvise Munari, head of equity structured solutions in London. Brent Clapacs, head of equity sales for Europe, Middle East and Africa, and Munari established the group, according to an internal memo obtained by DW, to "maintain our leadership in structured products." Munari was out of the office last week and Clapacs could not be reached. The date of the reorganization could not be determined, but it comes close to the departure of Donald Leitch (DW, 8/29), who was hired by Merrill last year as head of European equity and fund-linked structuring (DW, 5/9/04).
The three groups are liquid underlying and equity hybrids, fund-linked products and equity tax-linked products. Antoine Lebacq, who joined Merrill at the end of August as a managing director from Credit Suisse First Boston (DW, 4/1), will head up liquid underlying and equity-hybrids, reporting to Munari. Lebacq did not return messages. The fund-linked products group will be lead by director Frederic Marino, who is set to come on board from Rabobank in October (DW, 8/29), and equity tax-linked products will be headed by Salim Mohamed, who joined Merrill in June as a managing director from Goldman Sachs. Mohamed was traveling and could not be reached.
