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Phil Falcone picks new finance chief(Associated Press Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) NEW YORK -- Harbinger Group Inc., the holding company backed by hedge-fund magnate Phil Falcone, on Monday named a new chief financial officer. Thomas A. Williams will join Harbinger Group on March 5. Most recently he was CEO of RDA Holding, the parent company of Reader's Digest, for about six months last year, and was CFO for about two years before that. Williams was appointed to the top job at RDA after a board shakeup. When he left, the company didn't offer an explanation, though it did lose money for the roughly two quarters that he was in charge. Williams, 52, was previously the CFO of Affinion Group Holdings from 2007 and 2009. Before that, he spent more than 21 years with AT&T. Falcone's hedge fund, Harbinger Capital Partners, is best known for investing in distressed companies. Harbinger Group sells life insurance and last year expanded in consumer products, buying the majority of Spectrum Brands Holdings, which sells George Foreman grills, Remington shavers and Black & Decker appliances. Harbinger's current CFO, Francis McCarron, announced Feb. 17 that he would resign at the end of April. He said at the time that it was "the right time for me to move on to my next challenge" after about two years at Harbinger. He was previously the CFO of Triarc, the hedge fund run by Nelson Peltz. McCarron's announcement came the same week that federal regulators rejected an application by LightSquared, another company backed by Falcone, to build a new national wireless network. LightSquared has brought a host of other headaches, including big write-downs and investors' lawsuits. Investors have been barred from pulling their money from Harbinger for months, according to the Wall Street Journal. Harbinger Group's stock rose 2 percent in early trading, to $4.72. (c) 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. |