The European arm of RJ O’Brien is set to hire early next year Gemma Lloyd from GH Financials as its chief commercial officer, reuniting Lloyd with Mark Phelps the European head of RJO who used to run GHF.

Lloyd, who was until recently the chief business development officer at GH Financials, is set to join RJ O’Brien in London on January 3.

A spokeswoman for RJ O’Brien in Chicago confirmed the appointment.

Lloyd spent nearly a decade at GH Financials, rising to lead business development for the firm in London. In that role, she ran sales and client solutions as well as exchange and broker relationship management.

In her time at GH Financials, she was also responsible for global service delivery and product development.

Before joining GHF in early 2013, Lloyd worked in clearing sales at State Street, business development at SEB and futures clearing at Goldman Sachs.

At RJ O’Brien, Lloyd will reconnect with Phelps who became the RJO’s managing director of Europe, Middle East and Africa in March this year.

Phelps was previously the group chief executive of GH Financials for almost four years before leaving that position at the end of 2021.

In his ten years at GH, Phelps was also global head of sales and marketing working closely with Lloyd as head of business development.

RJO hired in September a five-strong metals brokerage team from inter-dealer broker BGC Partners.

RJ O’Brien promoted in January Amber Wright to global head of fixed income, a new post, in a move designed to build the firm’s rates broking business.

After Phelps’ departure GH Financials promoted its head of Asia Sharon Shi to become group chief executive, a post she assumed in September after transferring to London from Hong Kong.

GH Financials promoted last month Tony Butcher to run business relationships. Butcher, who joined GH Financials in 2010, was previously the firm’s global head of service delivery and global head of eSolutions.