Trading places

Bank One hires yen trader

Markou Athanasios will join Bank One in London as a senior yen spot trader on November 24, a senior official told FX Week. He reports to Stewart Morton, head of FX and interest rate derivatives trading in London, and replaces Jim Thompson, who has joined UK currency fund C-View.

Athanasios previously traded yen at SG in London. An SG official said the bank has not replaced him.

Merrill promotes Fleming and Kim

Merrill Lynch named Greg Fleming and Dow Kim as executive vice-presidents at a board of directors' meeting on October 27. They will continue with their current roles as co-heads of global markets and investment banking in New York.

"These appointments reflect the substantial contributions Greg and Dow have been making to Merrill Lynch as leaders of one of our key business groups," said Stan O'Neal, chairman and chief executive officer of Merrill Lynch, to whom they both report.

IG recruits from IFX

Thomas Friedrichkeit will join spread-betting firm IG Markets in London next Monday (November 24) to cover German and Austrian institutional sales. He will report to Halim Saad, head of institutional sales in London. Friedrichkeit joins from financial trading and spread-betting company IFX in London, where he covered European sales across several products. A source at IFX said he has not been replaced.

AIG Trading loses options trader

FX options trader Carl Nabar has left AIG Trading Group in Greenwich after only seven months. He reported to Don Lee, head of FX options and FX in Greenwich, and joined AIG in April from Credit Suisse First Boston in New York (FX Week, April 7), where he had worked for six years. A spokesperson at AIG declined to comment on Nabar's departure last week.

ABN adds in derivatives marketing

Rajiv Baruah has joined ABN Amro in Singapore as a derivatives marketer in the Asia debt markets origination group, which includes FX. He reports to Jamie McWilliam, head of derivatives marketing in Hong Kong, and Choo Hak Lee, regional head of debt capital markets in Hong Kong. He replaces Jayakumar Ganapathy, who recently transferred to the bank's London office in the same role. Baruah joins from Deutsche Bank in Mumbai, where he was co-head of Indian global markets.

Maizar leaves Goldman

Swiss corporate FX sales dealer Maroan Maizar left Goldman Sachs in London earlier this month, a source at the bank told FX Week.

Maizar joined the bank in September last year as head of corporate FX sales for Switzerland, and was originally based in Zurich.

Prior to Goldman, Maizar was a director in corporate derivatives sales for fixed income at Credit Suisse First Boston in Zurich.

Deutsche Bank's options head takes on trading

Neehal Shah, global head of FX options at Deutsche Bank, transferred from London to New York in the summer to assume the title of head of FX trading, North America. He retains global responsibility for global FX options.

In the trading role, Shah replaces Perry Parker, who now oversees the bank's non-franchise FX business globally.

Hedge fund adds Goldman dealer

New York-based hedge fund manager RG Niederhoffer Capital Management has hired Effie Anagnostopoulos for its FX trading team. She previously spent five years at Goldman Sachs in New York in forex sales and derivatives structuring roles, leaving there in 2001.