NEW YORK (Reuters) - Pacific Investment Management Co, the world's biggest manager of bond funds, named Mohamed El-Erian as its sole chief executive after co-CEO Bill Thompson retires at the end of the year.El-Erian returned to Pimco as co-CEO in January from Harvard University, where for two years he managed the school's $35 billion endowment. A specialist in emerging markets bonds with a record of outperformance, El-Erian had left Pimco to run the Harvard endowment, which is the world's largest.El-Erian, 50, will also continue in his role as co-chief investment officer with founder Bill Gross, the Newport Beach, California-based company said late Thursday.Thompson, 63, led Pimco for 15 years. During that period, the firm expanded from 125 employees and $40 billion in assets more than 1,000 employees and $840 billion of assets."PIMCO is going from 'strength to strength' as Mohamed takes the CEO reins from Bill," Gross said in a statement.German insurer Allianz
bought about 70 percent of Pimco in 2000.(Reporting by Joe Giannone in New York and Sweta Singh in Bangalore; Editing by Jacqueline Wong and Lisa Von Ahn)
(c) Reuters 2008. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by caching, framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.
