(UPDATES with additional information about advisory business,
Weil's appointment in paragraph 4)
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
Pacific Investment Management Co. announced that Chief Operating
Officer Richard Weil will oversee the giant asset manager's
advisory business.
Succeeding him will be Douglas Hodge, who has helped build
Pimco's Asia Pacific operations the past seven years. He joined
Pimco in 1989.
Chief Executive Mohamed A. El-Erian noted the company's advisory
business - which handles asset-valuation and monitoring services
among other duties - "has grown rapidly over the past several years
to serve the needs of our public and private sector clients around
the world."
Pimco has had the advisory business for a decade, but Weil, who
has been operating chief since 2000, would be its first former
global leader. Spokesman Mark Porterfield said the appointment "is
an indication of the importance that this business has become to
our clients and to the firm." The company doesn't disclose how much
of a portion the operation is of Pimco, a unit of German insurer
Allianz SE (AZ).
The change comes weeks after co-founder Bill Gross, who is also
co-chief investment officer with El-Erian, took over day-to-day
management of a closed-end fund which has struggled amid woes in
the high-yield corporate-bond market. El-Erian became Pimco's CEO
in September.
-By Kevin Kingsbury, Dow Jones Newswires; 201-938-2136;
kevin.kingsbury@dowjones.com