Credit Suisse Hires New Stock-Trading Head from UBS -Update
December 15 2016 - 8:31AM
Dow Jones News
By Liz Hoffman and Jenny Strasburg
Credit Suisse Group AG has hired a new head of equities from UBS
Group AG, hoping to reinvigorate its stock-trading business and
better ply that service to global billionaires .
Michael Stewart will join the Swiss bank to run equities in its
global markets business, the core of its trading operation,
according to a memo reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. He
currently sits at the intersection of UBS's massive
wealth-management franchise and its securities division, helping to
bring the type of institutional-level trading to wealth
clients.
Mr. Stewart previously oversaw global equities at UBS and before
that at Bank of America Corp.
That experience squares with Credit Suisse's goal of building an
investment bank around its roster of global wealth-management
clients. The restructuring of the bank under Chief Executive
Tidjane Thiam prioritizes trading, advisory and underwriting that
can be sold to the ultrarich world-wide.
In the process, the bank has shrunk its fixed-income trading and
derivatives business, but has continued to emphasize merger advice,
lending and trading by a pared-back stable of hedge-fund
clients.
Equities trading is key to the bank's offerings, Brian Chin,
head of Credit Suisse's markets business, said at a conference last
week.
Credit Suisse's revenue from trading stocks and stock-linked
instruments fell sharply this year from 2015, the result of "weaker
contribution from our equities businesses," particularly in Europe,
according to a November presentation.
Credit Suisse said in November it has now cut 5,400 jobs,
including contractors, of the 6,000 planned as part of its
restructuring.
Current equities chief Mike Paliotta, whose roles have included
overseeing equities trading and the prime brokerage unit that
handles trades and loans securities to hedge funds, will continue
in his role until June, according to the memo.
Mr. Stewart will be based in New York and will report to Mr.
Chin, who was promoted in a September shake-up at the top of the
markets business. Mr. Chin replaced Timothy O'Hara, who left after
less than a year as CEO of the business, which includes its
capital-intensive trading arm.
Mr. Stewart originally joined UBS in 2011 as head of securities
for the Americas and co-head of global equities. He later moved to
wealth management based in Zurich, a division with around $900
billion in invested assets at the end of 2015 and clients in more
than 40 countries.
Write to Liz Hoffman at liz.hoffman@wsj.com and Jenny Strasburg
at jenny.strasburg@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
December 15, 2016 08:16 ET (13:16 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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