Asia moves: Soc Gen replaces Asia chief, Deutsche Bank appoints wealth management head, and more

Societe Generale has named Gaëlle Olivier as new chief executive to replace Hikaru Ogata, who is stepping down to pursue new projects elsewhere. The appointment will be effective from the start of 2020, subject to regulatory approval. 

Olivier joins from Axa, where she has spent nearly 20 years in a variety of senior positions, including most recently as chief executive of the group property and casualty insurance business. She started her career at Crédit Lyonnais as a financial engineer on equity derivatives products. 

Olivier will be based in Hong Kong and will report to Séverin Cabannes, deputy chief executive officer. She will take up her new position at the start of 2020.

HSBC Private Banking has appointed Jackie Mau to the newly-created role of head of ultra-high-net-worth for Asia-Pacific. Mau was previously co-head of investment services and product solutions, along with Abdel Ben Tkhayet. Tkhayet now takes over full responsibility for this unit. 

Mau joined HSBC in 2003 and has held a number of senior client-facing roles across the investment and private banking units of the UK lender, in both Hong Kong and Thailand. Tkhayet joined HSBC and has held a wide variety of senior roles in both the private bank and global banking and markets, in France, the UAE, the UK and Hong Kong. 

Tkhayet will continue to report to Stuart Parkinson, chief investment officer for private banking, and to Siew Meng Tan, regional head of private banking for Asia-Pacific. Both will continue to be based in Hong Kong.

State Street has appointed Cara Brosnan to the newly-created position of head of sector solutions for Australia and South-east Asia. Brosnan will report to Jason Rich, head of sector solutions for Asia-Pacific. Brosnan previously worked at HSBC Securities Services, where she was head of insurance sector sales for the region. 

Prior to moving to Asia, Brosnan was sales director at HSBC Securities Services in Australia and Europe. Brosnan will continue to be based in Hong Kong.

Deutsche Bank has appointed Claudio de Sanctis as global head of its wealth management unit, succeeding Fabrizio Campelli who joins the group management board as chief transformation officer. De Sanctis was previously head of wealth management in Europe. He was also chief country officer of Switzerland, a role he will retain. 

De Sanctis joined Deutsche Bank from Credit Suisse, where he spent five years, initially as market area head for South-east Asia for private banking, Asia-Pacific, and most recently as head of private banking for Europe.

The bank has also made a number of senior strategic hires to its global South Asia wealth management team. Achal Aroura has been appointed managing director and group head, based in Dubai, while Mayank Khemka has been hired as head of discretionary portfolio management and chief investment officer
in India. 

The bank has also appointed Akshay Prasad as head of investment management for global South Asia. Aroura has worked in the financial industry for over 20 years, primarily in the UAE and India. 

He was previously a senior client adviser for Julius Baer. Khemka joins from Credit Suisse where he spent nine years as head of investment management for India. Prasad was previously head of capital markets for emerging markets at the bank.

Natixis has appointed Sander Mutsaers as managing director for its telecom industry group in Asia, based in Singapore. Mutsaers was previously director of telecom, media and technology for Asia-Pacific at ING. He began his career in 1999 at Rabobank for small and medium-sized enterprises.

The French bank has also appointed Xiaofei Guo as director of green and sustainable finance for Asia. Xiaofei joined Natixis in early October with a mandate to support green and sustainable deal origination and solutions sales. Previously, Xiaofei was part of ING’s sustainable finance and sustainable markets team. Before working with ING, Xiaofei worked for Bank Mendes Gans and China Construction Bank. 

Xiaofei will be based in Hong Kong and report to Orith Azoulay, global head of green and sustainable finance, and to Raghu Narain, head of investment banking for Asia-Pacific.

Fidelity International has appointed Daisy Ho as its president for China as the asset manager prepares to transition from an onshore private fund manager to a full asset management company in China. 

Ho, who joined Fidelity in 2005, was most recently the firm’s Asia ex-Japan managing director. She has held a variety of other institutional roles during her 14-year tenure at the firm. Ho will take up her new role at the start of 2020.

Allen & Overy has appointed Eugene Chen to its Asia-Pacific litigation and investigations team. Chen relocates to Hong Kong from Shanghai, where he has been working since 2007, most recently as head of the Chinese disputes group for rival law firm Hogan Lovells. 

Chen has also practised law in the US. Allen & Overy says the hire forms part of the firm’s wider strategic growth of its global white-collar crime practice.

Mayer Brown has announced the promotion of three lawyers in Asia to counsel and five lawyers in Asia to partner. 

The new counsels are James Lewis for litigation and dispute resolution, Carolin Rost for risk management and Michelle Yee for intellectual property. The  partners are Raymond Chan for litigation and dispute resolution, Jasmine Chiu for real estate, Amita Haylock for intellectual property, Nick Kouvaritakis for banking & finance and Jennifer Tam for employment and benefits.