Credit and political risk insurance broker Texel Group has made a raft of changes at the top of the organisation and its subsidiary Meridian Finance Group.

Meridian’s founder, Gary Mendell, has stepped down as president and taken the reins as executive chairman of the company, which was acquired by Texel in 2020.

Ben Roberts, who announced the moves in a company newsletter, has replaced Mendell as president of Meridian.

“I cannot do justice in a few words to the job Gary has done over the years leading Meridian, however we are grateful that we will continue to have his experience and input,” Roberts writes. Roberts remains president of specialty lines business Texel Americas.

Elsewhere, James Tiarks has assumed the position of managing director of Meridian, based in New York. Tiarks has spent the last eight years as a political and credit risk broker with Texel in Singapore.

“We are very excited that someone of James’ background will be leading the Meridian team going forward,” Roberts writes, adding that Texel “aims to be the leading specialist trade credit insurance broker in the US market”.

In a fourth move, the company announced that Anna Rogers, a Texel broker based in London, will relocate to New York to join Texel Americas. Rogers joined the group in 2017 from Lloyd’s of London.

Texel, founded in 1997, is an independent Lloyd’s political and credit risk insurance broker with offices in London, Brussels, Singapore and several locations in the US.

Texel first acquired a stake in Meridian in 2017 and bought the remainder of Meridian’s shares in August 2020.