Less than a month after getting an infusion of investment capital from some of Wall Street's biggest financial players, the Dubai Mercantile Exchange has named a new chief executive with experience as a fund manager. 

Thomas Leaver, who has been chief operating officer of the DME since May 2006, assumed the CEO post as of this week. According to a statement by the exchange on Tuesday, ex-CEO Gary King "has completed a phased handover of his responsibilities to Mr. Leaver."

"Mr. King's departure comes after the completion of a successful 12 months of trading and corporate development and the recently announced sale of strategic equity stakes in the exchange to a number of key international financial institutions and energy trading firms," the exchange added.

In early August, the DME said that Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, along with Royal Dutch Shell in Europe, had purchased minority stakes in the Dubai exchange. (See related article here.) The DME was established last year as a joint venture between the New York Mercantile Exchange, Tatweer (a member of Dubai Holding) and the Oman Investment Fund.

"Gary King and Thomas Leaver have worked together over the last 32 months to build a truly international and world class exchange. Our blue-chip shareholder and member base and the Exchange's ongoing growth as well as recognition of the flagship Oman Crude Oil Futures Contract as the third global benchmark for the pricing of crude oil are testament to their work," said Ahmad Sharaf, the exchange's chairman.

The DME offers more competition against established exchanges such as the IntercontinentalExchange in the U.S. Its flagship product line, Oman Crude Oil futures, is the only physically delivered Middle East sour crude oil futures contract. That has become a benchmark for pricing sour crude oil around the world.

Leaver has more than 30 years of experience in the energy industry, beginning with Edington Oil Co. in Long Beach, Calif., where he was a product manager involved in refining and crude oil marketing on both domestic and international levels. 

More recently, Leaver was an external consultant for McKinsey & Co., advising national and international oil companies in the Middle East, Europe and North America. Prior to accepting his position as chief operating officer of the DME, Leaver was a senior fund manager of RAB Capital's commodities energy fund in London.