Stock Exchange lines up deputy to take over Rolet’s crown

As City grandees rush to defend LSE chairman . . .

THE London Stock Exchange is lining up an emergency stand-in boss in case the vicious spat at the top of the firm forces the current chief to walk out.

LSE finance chief David Warren has reportedly been told to prepare to take over in to replace current boss Xavier Rolet should the Frenchman leave early.

The drastic step has been taken as a row between chairman Donald Brydon and billionaire hedge fund boss Sir Christopher Hohn escalates.

Hohn has called on regulators to remove Brydon from his post over the departure of the LSE’s imperious boss Rolet, 58. Hohn, 51, wants Rolet to stay and claims he is being forced out by Brydon.

The investor is asking shareholders to vote to reverse the decision and sack 72-year-old Brydon instead.

Its bosses’ fates will be decided at a meeting of shareholders later this year, which was called by Hohn’s business The Children’s Investment Fund (TCI).

TCI, which has a 5pc stake in the LSE, this week claimed Rolet is being threatened with a ‘character assassination’ by his own board if he refuses to go quietly. It asked the Bank of England to step in and oust Brydon.

In a letter on Tuesday night, Hohn said Rolet ‘is being improperly threatened by the board with severe reputational damage’.

Warning Brydon that legal action could follow if ‘you were to put your personal interests before the interests of the LSE’, Hohn said: ‘The corporate governance crisis which you have presided over has led to significant operational risk for the LSE which cannot be tolerated in a systemically important financial institution.

‘It seems to us that the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority both need to immediately intervene to instruct the board to appoint a new chairman who should be tasked with solving this corporate governance crisis.’

Yesterday, former colleagues of the chairman rallied to his support. Royal Mail chief executive Moya Greene was among the City big hitters to ride to the defence of Brydon, describing him as a ‘courageous’ leader. The comments came in a letter to the Financial Times. Its other signatories included David Challen, former senior independent director of engineer Smiths Group, and Ruth Markland, ex-senior independent director at accountancy software firm Sage Group.

All have previously served on boards with Brydon, who chaired the Royal Mail until 2015. They said: ‘Each of us has found Mr Brydon to be focused on creating shareholder value, with excellent governance, and to be willing to take courageous decisions in defence of both.’

Brydon and the board are preparing a potentially explosive dossier for shareholders, which outlines the reasons behind Rolet’s departure. The chief executive has run the company for eight years, during which time its value has surged from £800m to £13.3bn.

But despite his reputation for boosting investors’ coffers, the LSE boss is also seen as prickly and unwilling to tolerate dissent – allegedly falling out with previous chairman Chris Gibson-Smith.

Rolet announced his departure last month. It came after a failed attempt to sell the LSE to German rival Deutsche Boerse. He is due to leave next year after a successor has been found.

Yesterday, LSE shares fell by 0.2pc, or 7p, to 3803p.