Financial News presents a round-up of the week's top hires and job switches in the financial services industry.
The memo said: “We would like to express our thanks to Jeremy for his leadership, particularly in driving the culture and control agenda in Emea. He has been a significant force for improvement in the region’s governance and infrastructure.” Yasuo Kashiwagi, co-chief executive [deputy] for Emea, will now become acting chief executive with immediate effect. A spokesman confirmed the contents of the memo but declined to comment further.
A former fixed income specialist at Credit Suisse, Bennett was appointed as chief executive of Emea in April 2013 after three years in non-executive roles with the bank.
Well-known in regulatory circles, Bennett was a senior adviser to former Financial Services Authority chief executive Hector Sants in 2008, later helping to set up the Treasury’s Asset Protection Scheme.
He was also an adviser to Sir John Vickers’ Independent Commission on Banking, and is on the steering committee of the UK’s Fair and Effective Markets Review.
Bennett has strong experience in frontline banking, which dates back to the early 1990s when he was head of derivatives products in Asia for Bankers Trust. According to his LinkedIn profile, in 1997, he moved to Credit Suisse, where he led the structuring group and was co-head of European fixed income and global head of the emerging markets group over an eleven-and-a-half year spell.
Following his first stint in banking, he pursued an alternative career helping the UK to navigate the turbulent waters of the financial crisis. In February 2012, he was named deputy chairman of the Disasters Emergency Committee, the umbrella organisation for British disaster relief charities, which has recently launched appeals for civilians caught up in the Syrian civil war and the Ebola crisis.
Matt Turner
• Investment Banking
JP Morgan
JP Morgan has named a new head of its team serving investment-grade clients in western Europe, following the relocation of one of its most senior debt bankers to New York. Marc Baigneres, a Paris-based managing director focusing on French and Swiss issuance, will take over the role of head of western Europe investment-grade finance from Melissa Smith, according to an internal memo. Smith, a trained ballet dancer, moved to London in 2012 to take on that role but is now returning to her native US to lead the north-east corporate client banking business within JP Morgan’s commercial bank.
Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Bank of America Merrill Lynch has rejigged its global equities unit, handing new roles to two equity derivatives specialists. Julien Bahurel, head of equities distribution, is to expand his role to include head of Emea equities across sales and trading, and will also join the Emea executive committee. Bahurel joined the US bank last year as global head of equity derivative sales, later taking responsibility for equities distribution in Emea. Cyrille Walter, who joined in 2011 and was most recently global head of equity derivatives and Emea trading, will now lead the client solutions group, which contains BAML’s structured financing derivatives business. Steve Bayardelle, head of global trading for portfolio products, has been promoted to head the execution services group, reporting to Fabrizio Gallo. Syl Chackman is set to move to New York, but will continue in his role as co-head of global markets financing and futures.
Barclays
Joseph Mecane has joined the equities division of Barclays, The Wall Street Journal reports. Mecane was previously an executive vice-president at NYSE Group, a unit of IntercontinentalExchange. He oversaw the NYSE’s equities markets before being laid off as part of ICE’s staffing reduction in the spring. Before working at NYSE, he was a managing director at UBS for four years and chief operating officer of Knight Capital Group for five years. Knight Capital was absorbed by Getco last year, creating the combined company KCG Holdings.
ING
Henrik Ljungstrom has joined ING Syndicated Finance as a vice-president within the Emea loan sales team. He joins from Mizuho Bank, and has also worked at Lloyds Bank. Ljungstrom will report to Kim Bailes, global head of loan sales, and will primarily focus on structured finance loan sales, covering both banks and institutional investors.
• Asset Management
Pemberton
Pemberton has made its first hires since switching strategy over the summer to focus on direct lending. The firm has recruited two loan market veterans to run its origination effort. Thomas Duetoft joins as head of origination for Europe, while John Doyle becomes head of origination for the UK and Ireland. Both report to Symon Drake-Brockman, managing partner at Pemberton, which announced the two new hires in a statement. Duetoft has more than 20 years of experience of the loan and credit markets in Europe and Asia, having helped create Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein’s loan sales and trading business, before moving to RBS in 2006 to build a loan origination platform. He went on to run loan sales and sourcing in London for the bank in 2010. Most recently, he ran the fixed income business at capital markets firm Anoa Capital. Doyle, who has 18 years of experience of loan and credit markets in Europe and the US, joins from Siemens Bank in London, where he ran European leveraged finance. His previous roles include running leveraged portfolio management in Europe at Dresdner Kleinwort.
BNY Mellon
The firm has hired Tarek Sherlala as a senior executive in its Dubai branch. Sherlala will lead business strategy for the branch and oversee compliance of BNY Mellon’s activities in the Dubai International Financial Centre. He will continue as the company’s head of asset servicing in the Middle East and Africa.
• Hedge Funds and Wealth
Credit Suisse
The former head of operational due diligence at Hermes BPK has surfaced as the European head of prime consulting at Credit Suisse. Vincent Vandenbroucke will report to Dougal Brech, head of prime for Emea. The prime consulting division supports start-up and growing hedge funds with the implementation of technology platforms, recruitment, office space and compensation issues. Vandenbroucke had been at Hermes BPK for five years. He was previously global head of operational due diligence at Pioneer Alternative Investments for just over two years and has also been an operational due diligence analyst at Axa Investment Managers. From 2001 to 2002, he was controller, private equity, at Soros Fund Management.
• Trading and Technology
Illuminate Financial Management
The firm has hired Mark Whitcroft, who previously worked in debt syndication at Deutsche Bank and HSBC. He has taken on the role of principal in the firm’s five-strong London-based team. Before joining Illuminate Financial, Whitcroft was a director at Deutsche Bank in New York in a global team that advised, structured and sold bond transactions for international and US corporates. He joined the German bank in Asia from HSBC, where he worked in the bond and loan syndicate team.
Global Trading Systems
Ryan Sheftel, the global head of fixed income electronic trading at Credit Suisse, left the firm this month to take up a new post at Global Trading Systems, The Wall Street Journal reported. The New York firm is hiring Sheftel as its global head of fixed income to broaden its trading presence in Treasury bonds and interest rate derivatives. Electronic trading was a key focus for Credit Suisse under Sheftel. Among other responsibilities, he was head of one of the bank’s newest subsidiaries, Wake USA, which the Swiss bank uses to trade US Treasuries, bond futures and other products electronically.
Caplin Systems
The firm has appointed John Ashworth as chief executive. He succeeds founder Paul Caplin, who is to remain on the board as executive chairman. Ashworth joined Caplin as chief operating officer in February, having been CEO of Fenics software and a non-executive director of software firm Apama.
Marex Spectron
The global commodities broker has appointed Carla Stent, formerly chief operating officer of Virgin Group, as a non-executive director. Stent has been operations director of Thomas Cook, as well as holding several senior positions at Barclays, serving as deputy chief financial officer and chief administrative officer at its global retail and commercial banking division.
• Private Equity
HIG Capital
The private equity investment firm has appointed Gabriele Magotti as a director in its Milan office. He joins from Deutsche Bank, where he was head of southern Europe for the alternative and real assets team. HIG opened its Milan office this year to work across private equity transactions, credit investments, debt solutions, real estate and other investment opportunities.
CVC Capital Partners
The buyout firm has hired Tomas Ekman, it said in a statement, who previously worked as a partner and managing director in the Nordic team at UK-listed private equity house 3i group. He left the firm last year when it cut its Nordic team from four partners to two as part of a strategic review. Fredrik Karlsson and Mattias Eklund became co-heads of 3i’s Nordic team from July last year. Ekman worked at 3i from 2004, according to his LinkedIn profile, which says he also formerly served as a captain in the Royal Swedish Naval Military Academy and spent three years at Bain & Company, where he worked as a management consultant, before joining 3i.
• Legal, Regulatory and Consulting
Morningstar
Morningstar, the fund research house, has recruited a former investment chief at Kleinwort Benson and Merrill Lynch to head its manager research team for the UK. Jeremy Beckwith was chief investment officer at Kleinwort Benson between 2003 and 2011, and before that headed the team responsible for managing clients’ portfolios at Merrill Lynch’s European private bank. He was the interim chief investment officer for new online wealth manager Nutmeg for five months in 2012, and became a founding partner of boutique wealth adviser London Wall Partners later that same year, where he has been since.
Travers Smith
Stephanie Biggs has joined the law firm as a partner in its financial services and markets department. She joins the five-partner team from Kirkland & Ellis, where she has been a partner since 2009.
Inalytics
The fund manager evaluation firm has announced the appointment of Neiloy Ghosh to its client servicing team. Ghosh joins from Hermes Investment Management, where he was most recently head of investment office following a 17-year career at the firm. He will assume the position of director, client services, at Inalytics.
