Credit Suisse Said to Hire Deutsche Bank Equities Executives

(Bloomberg) -- Credit Suisse Group AG has hired two senior equities executives in Asia from Deutsche Bank AG, a person familiar with the matter said, amid a restructuring of the Swiss bank’s global markets business and a recent leadership change in the region.

Neil Hosie will join Credit Suisse as head of equities for the Asia-Pacific region, and Patrick Kelly has been hired as Asia-Pacific head of equity client trading and execution, the person said, asking not to be identified because the matter hasn’t been publicly disclosed. Both men resigned from the German bank last week, according to people familiar with the matter.

Representatives from Credit Suisse and Deutsche Bank declined to comment, as did Kelly. Hosie couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

Credit Suisse has been restructuring its Asian equities and fixed-income businesses, which have recently been consolidated under Ken Pang, appointed last month to succeed Ali Naqvi as head of global markets for the Asia-Pacific region. Naqvi is now executive chairman of the unit.

The bank plans further cuts in its Asian equities business over the coming three months, Chief Executive Officer Tidjane Thiam said last week, while signaling that cost reductions across the whole bank will start to slow this year. Thiam has been shrinking investment banking in favor of wealth management, where the bank sees the best potential for growth.

Recent Departures

Credit Suisse last month cut several senior equities job in the region. The departures included Donald Lee, co-head of cash equities for the Asia-Pacific, Matt Pecot, head of prime services for the region, and Jamie White, a Hong Kong-based director for sales trading.

At Deutsche Bank, Hosie headed Asia-Pacific equities trading and Kelly was a managing director and head of facilitation trading. Their departures follow a decision by Anthony Byrne, formerly Asia-Pacific head of prime finance and Japan equities, to leave Deutsche Bank earlier this year.

Deutsche Bank’s trading unit lost market share in the fourth quarter as Chief Executive Officer John Cryan cut assets and clients concerned about the company’s finances pulled back. The bank’s equities business was still “flattish to slightly down” in January compared with a year earlier, though the firm’s debt-trading business saw a 40 percent increase in the month, Chief Financial Officer Marcus Schenck said on a call with analysts in February.

Credit Suisse increased its bonus pool for 2016 by 6 percent in an effort to prevent an exodus of talent from its investment banking and Asian operations, defying a trend toward smaller payments at many of its peers. Deutsche Bank cut its bonus pool by almost 80 percent, a figure unmatched in its recent history.

To contact the reporter on this story: Cathy Chan in Hong Kong at kchan14@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Marcus Wright at mwright115@bloomberg.net, Sree Vidya Bhaktavatsalam