The seriousness of staff departures from funds managers ramped up in Q2 2010 compared with Q1, and boutiques were hit for the first time, Standard & Poors’ ‘Musical Chairs: Fund Managers on the Move’ report has found.

During the second quarter of this year, Standard & Poors announced 11 key staff departures from rated funds managers, slightly fewer than in Q1 but of a more concerning nature, and causing the agency to raise more ‘red flags’.

Given their higher staff numbers, it did not surprise S&P that most Q2 departures – 82 per cent – were from mainstream funds management organisations, however their ratings were only placed ‘on hold’ or downgraded to ‘sell’ on 23 per cent of occasions.

However when marquee names left boutique funds managers – the resignation of Australian Ethical chief investment officer, Martin Halloran, and RARE Infrastructure portfolio manager Sarah Shaw are prime examples – ratings were affected in 100 per cent of cases.

The merger-digesting BlackRock has suffered the highest number of investment staff departures year-to-date with four, while AMP Capital, Amundi, Challenger and Perpetual have each lost two.