Gartmore, one of the largest hedge fund managers in the world with $6 billion under management, is denying that its business is under threat from a mass walkout, according to Reuters.
London’s Sunday Times has reported that ten senior executives have cashed in options worth hundreds of thousands of pounds each, and that fund managers were cashing in their options as a precursor to leaving the company after rumors that its US parent, Nationwide Mutual Insurance, was trying to reduce their pay.
The options were given to employees after Nationwide bought Gartmore in 2000, expired on Tuesday and payments are due in 30 days after which the managers planned to resign, the paper said. A Gartmore spokeswoman said the cashing in of options is “natural” and that 10 executives represented less than 10% of the scheme’s membership.
“There is not dissatisfaction right across the company. Nationwide have been a really, really good parent,” the spokeswoman told the Times. “One person might have rung up the Sunday Times because they are fed up, but I don’t think that across Gartmore that is the situation.” The spokeswoman added that the executives in question were not just fund managers. “It could be fund managers, HR, communications. Right across the board,” she said.