MILAN BlackRock, the world's biggest asset manager, has named Giovanni Sandri, its current head of Italy, as head of southern Europe, creating a cluster that also includes Spain, Portugal, Greece and Israel, two sources familiar with the matter said.

The southern Europe cluster follows similar regional hubs BlackRock created across Europe such as Germany-Switzerland, France-Belgium-Luxembourg, and the Nordics.

The newly created southern European region employs around 200 people and accounts for some 400 billion euros in assets under management, one of the sources said.

The regional structure aims to boost coordination across countries to help business development as well as internal representation, the people added.

(Reporting by Valentina Za; Editing by Keith Weir)