Alliance Capital Names New CEO

Alliance Capital Management Holding, whose stakes in bankrupt companies such as WorldCom Inc. led investors to withdraw $12 billion from its mutual funds last year, named Lewis A. Sanders its chief executive Monday.

The appointment gives Sanders, 56, day-to-day responsibility to run the firm, a job Bruce W. Calvert has held the last four years. Calvert, 56, will remain chairman, Alliance said in a statement.

Sanders needs to shore up investor confidence after Alliance’s stock funds had the worst performance among the 12 publicly traded U.S. fund managers last year, analysts said. Sanders ran Sanford C. Bernstein & Co., known for its independent research, until the firm was bought by Alliance in October 2000.

Alliance shares fell 76 cents to $27.44 on the New York Stock Exchange.

Investors in New Jersey and Florida have sued Alliance for allowing its mutual funds to lose hundreds of millions of dollars on Enron Corp. stock before the energy trader’s collapse.

The New York-based company’s flagship Premier Growth Fund owned 7.1 million shares in Enron and didn’t sell them before the energy trader collapsed. The fund fell 32% last year, trailing 89% of similar funds.

From Bloomberg News