Rittereiser Gets 2nd Title at E. F. Hutton

Robert P. Rittereiser, recently named president of E. F. Hutton Group, has been elected to the additional position of chief operating officer, the company announced Thursday.

In his new role, Rittereiser will be responsible for day-to-day operations of both the parent company and its broker-dealer subsidiary, E. F. Hutton & Co. He will continue to report to Robert Fomon, chairman and chief executive, the New York-based company said.

The company also announced that it had defined the role of the office of the chairman, a newly formed group of four top executives that will begin operating this month.

The office will review all major policy and strategic issues, major capital expenditures, risk exposure and resource allocation, among other duties, company officials said.

Rittereiser and Fomon are joined in that office by Scott Pierce, president of E. F. Hutton & Co., and Thomas Lynch, who preceded Rittereiser as president and is now vice chairman of the parent company.

On May 2, Hutton’s brokerage division, the nation’s fifth-largest investment house, agreed to pay a $2-million fine after pleading guilty to 2,000 charges of mail and wire fraud in a check-writing scheme. No charges were levied against the parent company or its employees.

Rittereiser, a 26-year veteran of Merrill Lynch & Co., the nation’s largest investment firm, was named president of E. F. Hutton’s brokerage division June 3.