ANGLO AMERICAN, the world’s third biggest mining group, lost £544 million in value yesterday after appointing Cynthia Carroll, a relative unknown, as chief executive.

Mrs Carroll, who will receive a salary of up to £4 million a year including bonuses, has spent the past 18 years at Alcan, the Canadian aluminium producer.

Analysts were surprised by the choice because Mrs Carroll has a low profile outside the aluminium industry, and they questioned what abilities Anglo had seen in Mrs Carroll that Alcan had not when it passed her over for the chief executive’s job this year. Anglo American pointed out that Mrs Carroll, who was president of Alcan’s primary metals group, has a strong record in developing project pipelines.

Anglo is in the middle of a restructuring that will see it divest non-core assets and its lack of focus has led to speculation that it will become the target for predators wanting to break it up.

The company’s share price dropped 36p to £23.79 after the appointment. But Mrs Carroll, who will replace Tony Trahar when he retires on March 1, told The Times last night that she was unconcerned by the market reaction. She said: “There are a lot of challenges ahead and I don’t want to lose the momentum that Anglo has built up in its restructuring programme.”

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