Sugar Giant Alvean Loses More Traders After COO Departure

(Bloomberg) -- Alvean, the world’s top sugar-trading company, is losing more people after the exit of the chief operating officer last month.

Options trader Sophie Maze, hired in Geneva at the end of last year, and five other employees left, Alvean said Friday in a statement responding to Bloomberg questions. Maze, formerly with BP Plc, was hired to exploit the links between sugar and energy, helping diversify earnings.

Alvean, a venture between U.S. agribusiness giant Cargill Inc. and Brazilian sugar and ethanol producer Copersucar SA, confirmed last week that COO Soren Jensen left. He held the job since the company was formed in 2014 after working for Copersucar. The departures follow the appointment of Gareth Griffiths, a former Noble Group Ltd. energy executive, as chief executive officer in May 2017.

“Our strategy, and our commitment to that strategy, remain firmly in place,” Alvean said in the statement. “The departures simply reflect our ongoing drive for high performance efficiency and, accordingly, at least some are intended to be replaced.”

Apart from Maze, the other five employees worked in front-, middle- and back office positions at various locations, Alvean said.

Alvean focuses on trading raw and refined sugar. Ethanol is handled separately by Copersucar with Cargill managing grain.

To contact the reporter on this story: Isis Almeida in Chicago at ialmeida3@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Tina Davis at tinadavis@bloomberg.net, Patrick McKiernan, James Attwood

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