Oxbridge academic Hotson lined up to run City broker Cenkos

A former Bank of England economist who teaches history at Cambridge and Oxford universities is being lined up as the next boss of Cenkos, the City stockbroker.

Sky News has learnt that Anthony Hotson, who already sits on Cenkos' board as a non-executive director and chairs its remuneration committee, ‎has been identified as the preferred candidate to succeed the outgoing chief executive, Jim Durkin.

Mr Hotson is thought to have indicated his intention to accept the role, and an announcement is expected to be made as soon as this week.

If confirmed‎, his appointment will make him an unusual choice to run one of London's most prominent broking firms, which has brought a slate of high-profile companies to the public markets.

Mr Hotson's career at the Bank of England began almost 40 years ago, and took in stints in the Governor's office, money markets division and economics unit.

He went on to work for McKinsey, the management consultants, and SG Warburg, the investment bank.

As an academic, he works as a deputy director of the Centre for Financial History at Darwin College, Cambridge, and an associate member of Oxford's history faculty.

Cenkos surprised the City in May when it announced that Mr Durkin would step down after five years at the helm - a period that saw the firm notch up its biggest-ever payday by bringing the AA (Frankfurt: A116XA - news) breakdown‎ recovery service to the London stock market.

Cenkos earned a £30m fee for that deal.

Among the companies it has helped to float in recent months was Eddie Stobart, the logistics group, and Cenkos has described its new business pipeline as encouraging.

Trading has been tougher in the last 18 months, however, with revenue declining in 2016 by 43% and pre-tax profit by 78%, as a consequence of fewer major equity-raisings carried out on behalf of clients.

The broker has faced o‎ther difficulties over the last year, with a £500,000 fine imposed by the City watchdog last year over its role as sponsor to Quindell (Berlin: 30382595.BE - news) , a controversial insurance technology company now known as Watchstone.

A Cenkos spokesman declined to comment on Sunday.