Asia moves: Barclays picks Pecot as markets head, new Australia CEO for Credit Suisse, and more

Barclays has named Matt Pecot as head of markets for Asia-Pacific, in addition to his current role as head of equities for the region. 

Pecot will continue to be based in Hong Kong and report directly to Stephen Dainton, head of global markets. Pecot is responsible for leading the Asia-Pacific markets business, which focuses on credit, equities including derivatives, prime and cash electronic execution services, and macro. 

He joined Barclays in 2018 as head of equities. He has close to 25 years of industry experience and, before joining Barclays, was head of prime services and head of equities distribution at Credit Suisse in Asia-Pacific.

Credit Suisse has named Richard Gibb as chief executive officer of Australia, effective from October 2019. He will replace John Knox, who has decided to leave the Swiss bank this year after a 24-year career.

Gibb joins from Deutsche Bank where he has worked for the past 10 years. Since 2016, he has been head of corporate finance for Asia-Pacific, based in Hong Kong, and, prior to that, was the global head of financial institutions, based in New York. 

Gibb has more than 30 years’ experience in senior leadership roles in investment banking across Hong Kong, New York and Sydney. He has previously worked at Merrill Lynch, Bankers Trust and Westpac. As CEO of Australia, he will lead the Australian franchise across investment banking and capital markets, private banking, markets and financing.

Citi has appointed Curt Engler as Asia-Pacific head of execution services. Based in Hong Kong, he will be responsible for the firm’s regional execution business and oversee all the execution desks for Citi’s cash equities business in the region, where clients buy and sell stock via Citi’s high touch, program and electronic desks. 

Engler, who has worked in financial markets for more than 20 years, joins from JP Morgan Asset Management in New York, where he was head of trading for the Americas and oversaw the trading operations of over $250 billion in assets under management. 

He also led the build out of trading technology to support significantly increased levels of automation and the usage of analytics to improve execution performance.

Rico Leung has been appointed as executive director (supervision of markets) at Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) for a term of three years. 

Leung’s appointment is effective from August 28. He is currently a senior director of the SFC’s supervision of markets division and will succeed Keith Lui, who retires on August 27. 

The regulator also said Lester Garson Huang has been reappointed as non-executive director for a term of two years, effective from November 15. 

HSBC Securities Services has named Anastasia Aurol as vice-president, China business development for asset owners and managers (AO&M). Aurol would be based in New York and report locally to the head of AO&M business development and client management, Americas, and functionally to the head of AO&M business development and client management, China. 

She will be responsible for helping drive China business development growth within the Americas asset owners and managers client segment. 

Aurol joins HSBC from Standard Chartered Bank, where she spent over 12 years in a variety of roles, most recently as China access specialist at the bank’s transaction banking division.

JP Morgan Asset Management (JPMAM) has appointed Nick Kim as an exchange-traded fund (ETF) specialist in the firm’s Asia beta strategies team, with a focus on Asia ETFs. 

Kim will be responsible for strengthening ETF client relationships and will focus on bringing JPMAM’s existing global ETF capabilities, including more than 30 ETFs listed in the US and more than 20 ETFs listed in Europe, to Asian investors on a cross-border basis. 

He joins from Mirae Asset Global Investment, where he served as global ETF sales vice-president. He is based in Hong Kong and reports to Sean Cunningham, head of Asia ETFs at JPMAM.

BNP Paribas has hired Chaoni Huang as head of sustainable capital markets, global markets for Asia-Pacific. In this newly created role, Huang will be responsible for driving and managing BNP Paribas’ sustainable finance solutions for corporates, financial institutions and investors with a focus on primary, asset finance and securitisation. 

Based in Hong Kong, she will report to Liang Si, head of debt capital markets and syndicate, global markets, Asia-Pacific at BNP Paribas. 

Huang has 12 years of experience and joins BNP Paribas from Natixis, where she was executive director, green and sustainable solutions.

Willis Towers Watson has hired Lihui Gong as head of broking for Hong Kong. In this new role, Gong will be responsible for the broking operations in Hong Kong, including carrier management, facilities development and panels, implementation of key broking systems and empowering firm’s broking operation with the enhanced use of data and analytics. She will also be part of the regional broking team and reports to Ben Dunston, head of broking in Asia. 

With over a decade of experience in the insurance market in Greater China, Gong brings with her a strong set of skills and competencies to this role. Prior to Willis Towers Watson, she was the relationship manager at Jardine Lloyd Thompson in Hong Kong.