Senior staff shuffle at CFS

Colonial First State has confirmed that Al Clarke has been appointed head of investments following the departure of Peter Dymond as director of portfolio management.

Another longstanding executive George Lin has resigned as a senior investment manager.

Clark fills this newly created role from MLC Asset Management, where he ran investments under the then investment chief Jonathan Armitage.

Armitage has since joined CFS as a chief investment officer

Armitage left MLC last August  after Insignia Financial - formerly IOOF Holdings - combined its investment management teams after buying MLC Wealth and installed Dan Farmer as investment head.

Clark brings deep experience to the role, having spent the last two decades building investment solutions for retail and institutional clients in Australia and Asia.

He was previously global head of multi-asset with Nikko Asset Management, Schroders Investment Management and BT Financial Group.

Clark started his investing career at Macquarie Bank, where he managed a range of domestic and international fixed-income portfolios.

The fund also confirmed the promotion of Ben Lam to head of equities and Robert Graham-Smith to head of fixed income and alternatives.

Both were previously senior investment managers in their respective fields.

Before his seven years at CFS, Lam did an eight-year stint at Mercer Investment and spent two years at MLC.

Earlier Graham-Smith worked at mine Super, Perpetual and Select Asset Management.

Meantime, Chetan Soorkea and Ramali De Zoysa have been promoted to senior investment analysts.