CBA and Colonial merge funds management…

TheCommonwealth Bank (CBA)andColonial First Statehave rolled their respective asset management divisions into one despite earlier assurances that such a move would not be on the cards.

Colonial First State chief executive officer, Chris Cuffe, has been named as head of the combined Commonwealth Investment Management (CIM) and Colonial First State Investments, with a brief to apply the Colonial First State business model to the merged entity.

The news of the merging of the two asset management divisions comes two months after Colonial First State’s group managing director, Peter Polson, denied in an interview withMoney Managementthat a merger of the two groups would take place.

Under the restructure announced yesterday, the management of all Commonwealth and Colonial asset classes will be combined, with the exception of Australian equities.

Colonial First State’s Australian equities team, to be headed by Ian Harding following this week’s announcement of the impending departure of Greg Perry, will not take on any additional CIM Australian equity funds as a result of the investment restructure.

The combined asset classes and separate Australian equities teams will report to Colonial First State’s general manager of investments John Pearce.

The first hint of the asset management restructure came in December last year when the Commonwealth Bank’s managing director David Murray announced a restructure of the group’s insurance and investment arm over the Christmas break.