Parker Asset Management, the Australian fund management boutique, has launched a new sales office in London, naming Richard Blank as head of sales for Asia and Europe.

Parker Asset Management’s fund was ranked Australia’s number one long-only equity fund in the 2011 Mercer results, and Parker believes that it will prove attractive to European investors who are “faced with continued economic uncertainty and increasing levels of sovereign risk in their own region”. The fund has delivered 17 per cent returns each year for the past three years, the firm said.

Blank was latterly contracted as an investment market specialist, seconded to Rabobank’s compliance division. During his career he has held sales and marketing roles in a range of fund managers, hedge funds, investment banks and private wealth managers, including Grunberg & Co, Credit Suisse First Boston and Credit Lyonnais Securities.