Reuters names economics editor, Canada bureau chief and regional editor

Dayan Candappa, editor of the Americas at Reuters, sent out the following staff appointments on Monday:

I’m delighted to announce that three very talented and experienced Reuters journalists – Tiffany Wu, David Chance and Amran Abocar – will be moving into key roles in the Americas. Please join me in wishing them all the best in their new assignments.

Tiffany Wu

Tiffany will take over as Desk Editor and Deputy Regional Editor, bringing 16 years of experience across the file, exceptional copy editing skills and deep knowledge of our news-editing operations to the leadership of the Americas Desk. Tiffany will partner with my other deputy, Top News Editor Martin Howell, in driving news coverage across the Americas  She will work closely with the specialist editors to shape the next phase of the desk’s transformation.

Tiffany takes over from Ciro Scotti, whose next move will be announced soon. I am grateful to Ciro for his strong contribution over the past two years and for the unified editing desk he leaves behind. Tiffany and I will be building on the foundation he has laid.

Tiffany has done many of the key jobs at Reuters – reporter, bureau chief, top news editor and regional specialist editor who had responsibility for the companies desking team – giving her a rounded view of the editing desk’s pivotal role.

Tiffany moved to New York eight years ago as our Tech, Media and Telecoms Editor, and was promoted to run Company News in the Americas in 2010. She joined the Top News Team in September 2012 and has helped guide our coverage of a wide range of front page stories, from cyber attacks and the fallout from the Snowden leaks to big corporate shake-ups and the Quebec train derailment disaster.

Tiffany joined Reuters in 1998 as a macro-economics correspondent in Hong Kong, where she was born and raised. Two years later she moved to Shanghai to cover Chinese financial markets and corporate news, and then went on to Taipei where she was bureau chief from 2003 to 2006.

David Chance

David will move to Washington as Economics Editor for the Americas to drive coverage of the world’s largest economy and some of its most promising and problematic emerging markets. David, who will report to me, will work with reporters, editors and bureau chiefs across the region to ensure that Reuters brings to the economics and policy story the urgency and ambition our readers expect of us.

David has been with Reuters for 23 years, mostly covering economics and markets from the Argentine and Russian financial crises to the rebound in emerging markets. His most recent posting was in Seoul where a three-year stint saw him cover the death of Kim Jong Il, the ascent to power of Kim Jong Un and North Korea’s third nuclear test and rocket launches. David admits that his hands were shaking when he filed the snap of Kim Jong Il’s death from a North Korean television broadcast, something he assures me will not happen when he’s handling alerts on the Fed.

Prior to Seoul, David was Bureau Chief Malaysia and Brunei and before that Bureau Chief in Hungary in addition to stints in London and New York, where his eldest son was born. The Chance family will return to the United States after 16 years early in the summer.

Amran Abocar

Amran returns to Canada as bureau chief after six years in Asia and the Middle East, where she covered everything from Dubai’s property bust and the Arab Spring to bizarre mining policies in Indonesia. It is an exciting time for her new team which has lots of hot stories and the full attention of the F&R business, for whom Canada is a top priority in the Americas. Amran and her colleagues will be looking for creative ways to expand the breadth of our file and ramp up enterprising coverage at the same time.

Amran knows Reuters Toronto well; she joined the company there as an editorial intern and moved to a number of reporting and editing roles covering companies, capital markets, treasury and the SARS outbreak in Canada. She left for Dubai in 2008, just as the emirate’s economy was imploding, and ran the financial team in the Gulf for four years. She was appointed Deputy Bureau Chief, Gulf  just in time for the Arab Spring revolts that rocked the region. Amran then moved to Singapore as Deputy Commodities Editor for Asia. A Somali Canadian, Amran will return home with two boys who want to build an army of snowmen to make up for the years in the Arabian desert and tropical Southeast Asia. They will have to be patient as Amran will remain in Singapore until the summer.