ING Investment Management Americas, a unit of ING Group NV in the Netherlands, said it has hired a former Merrill Lynch executive to head its distribution of products for individual investors.
James Kase was named an executive vice president and head of distribution. He will also sit on the firm's management committee, the company said on Monday.
He was chief operating officer of the Merrill Lynch Investment Managers U.S. institutional business. Before joining Merrill in 2000, he held senior posts at Lehman Brothers Inc., including head of equity sales and research in Asia. Before that he was responsible for institutional fixed-income derivative sales at the former Swiss Bank Corp. and earlier managed the U.S. derivative sales-pension group at the former Bankers Trust.
Mr. Kase is to take responsibility for ING Investment Management's institutional and managed account businesses as well as its consultant and client-relationship functions.
