Hartleys moves

BROKING house Hartleys will lose two senior staff next month, when high-profile dealer Andrew Frazer and industrial analyst Steve Piotrowski join rival firms.

Mr Frazer will be starting with Paterson Ord Minnett on August 4 while Mr Piotrowski will join DJ Carmichael one week later.

The losses come as Hartleys works toward finalising its management buy-out.

The MBO team has raised $4.5 million to recapitalise the business but that amount was considered inadequate to support Mr Frazer’s high-volume trading.

He said the main reason for moving was that he did not want to invest any more money in the broking industry.

Mr Frazer said he plans to retain his 6 per cent shareholding in Australian Stock Exchange-listed Hartleys, which is expected to change its name to JDV (to reflect its back-office technology business) after the MBO is completed.

Mr Piotrowski, who has been at Hartleys for just more than a year, will fill a gap in Carmichael’s research team following the recent departure of Peter Strachan (who is now self-employed) and Justin Stewart (who joined Euroz).

Mr Piotrowski’s move leaves Hartleys with a very lean research department, comprising resources analyst Kevin Tomlinson assisted by Simon Tonkin.