The Financial Post reports in its Thursday edition that Royal Bank of Canada has hired Ed Skilton from Barclays PLC to lead its insurance investment banking practice in Europe. A Bloomberg dispatch to the Post says Mr. Skilton will start in early May. He will be a managing director based in London. Mr. Skilton was most recently the global co-head of insurance and head of the financial institutions group for the United Kingdom at Barclays. While at Barclays, Mr. Skilton worked on deals including the pending roughly $14.75-billion sale of property and casualty insurer Beazley PLC to Zurich Insurance Group AG and JAB Insurance's acquisition of the U.K. life and pension business of Utmost Group. RBC has hired eight managing directors across Europe in the past year.