He most recently served as the firm’s head of sales for EMEA and will report to Rob Fairbairn, head of BlackRock’s global client group and James Charrington, chairman of the EMEA region for BlackRock.

Hoctor-Duncan will also join BlackRock’s EMEA and GCG executive committees, and will continue to be based in London, the firm said in a statement today.

The new role has been created as the firm “realigns its international retail business along regional lines”, it said.

Maarten Slendebroek, who had been responsible for international retail since 2010, is leaving BlackRock after assisting with the transition of roles until the end of April.

In Asia-Pacific, Mark McCombe, BlackRock’s chairman of Asia-Pacific, will oversee the retail business in that region. Similarily, in Latin America & Iberia, Armando Senra, deputy head of the Latin America & Iberia Region, will oversee the retail business in that region.

Prior to being appointed to his previous role as head of retail sales for EMEA in 2009, Hoctor-Duncan had been the head of UK retail since 2007 and head of UK retail sales since 2005. Prior to that, he had worked within GCG with responsibility for developing and maintaining relationships with retail investors.

The biggest asset manager of its type in the world, at 31 December 2011 BlackRock’s oversaw a total of $3.513 trillion assets.