BlackRock bank loan fund manager stepping down: memo

By Trevor Hunnicutt

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A BlackRock Inc managing director and portfolio manager has relinquished his role leading several debt funds to "pursue other interests," according to an internal memo seen by Reuters on Thursday.

Leland Hart, who has been with the company for seven years and has headed the company's bank loans team, will no longer oversee funds including the nearly $3 billion BlackRock Floating Rate Income Fund.

Hart will maintain an advisory role with the company's infrastructure debt team "in the months ahead," according to the memo provided by the company. He joined BlackRock after the company's acquisition of his previous employer, R3 Capital Partners.

Hart's departure from the funds comes at the same time as an earlier-announced exit by Paul Ebner, a director who was part of a different team that uses quantitative analysis to select stocks, according to a statement. Ebner's last day is Friday.

Hart managed $10.8 billion in money and accounts at BlackRock as of last year, while Ebner oversaw $2.2 billion, according to earlier disclosures BlackRock made with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

"We are grateful for all he has done for the firm and our clients and wish him our best," said the memo discussing the succession plan for Hart, which was signed by BlackRock's Global Head of Fundamental Credit Jim Keenan.

Institutional shares of BlackRock Floating Rate Income Fund are up 2.6 percent this year, through Wednesday, behind the 3.1 percent average of its peers, according to Lipper. Over five years, the fund ranks in the 13th percentile among its peers.

New York-based BlackRock managed $4.7 trillion in assets as of March 31.

(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt; Editing by Bernard Orr and Tom Brown)

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