Blackrock names Apac head of wealth
Blackrock has appointed Guilherme Lima to the newly-created position of Asia Pacific head of wealth.
Working alongside wealth managers, private banks and family offices, Lima will develop strategies that draw from the full spectrum of Blackrock’s offerings to address the needs of wealth clients throughout the region. He will be based in Hong Kong.
Lima joins Blackrock from Westpac, where he led private banking, commercial banking and SME banking as CEO of the business division from 2019. He previously spent more than a decade with HSBC, at which he had a variety of Hong Kong-based leadership roles in wealth, premier banking and strategy. Earlier, he was regional head of retail banking and wealth management for HSBC Latin America in Sao Paulo, and chief of staff to the group CEO in London. Before HSBC, he was a partner at McKinsey in New York and Sao Paulo.
Value Partners appoints group president
Value Partners announces the appointment of June Wong as the group’s president, effective 18 October 2021.
Based in Hong Kong, Wong will be responsible for managing the group’s overall business and corporate strategy and operations, reporting directly to the group’s co-chairmen and co-chief investment officers Dato’ Seri Cheah Cheng Hye and Louis So. She will also become a member of the group’s leadership committee alongside the co-chairmen.
Wong has three decades of experience in the finance, actuarial and asset management industries across Asia. Most recently, she was Asia ex-Japan CEO for State Street Global Advisors. Before that, she served as vice chairman for Asia Pacific at Columbia Threadneedle. Other senior leadership roles she has held include senior managing director and head of Asia ex-Japan institutional business at Alliance Bernstein and head of business development at HSBC Asset Management.
Wong currently serves on the advisory committee of the Securities and Futures Commission of Hong Kong.
UBS hires new economy chief
Binnie Wong joined UBS as managing director, team head of the new economy strategy business development team, effective 11 October 2021. She reports to both Gaetano Bassolino, head of global banking Apac, UBS investment bank and LH Koh, co-head of global family office Apac, UBS Global Wealth Management (GWM).
The new economy initiative is sponsored by Amy Lo, co-head wealth management Apac, UBS GWM and David Chin, head of investment bank Apac and head of China), who serve as operating lead to provide leadership and guidance.
Wong has more than 15 years of experience covering the TMT industry, most recently at HSBC.
Deutsche Bank hires ex-Bank of Singapore MD
A former managing director from Bank of Singapore has joined Deutsche Bank Wealth Management in Singapore.
Faye Lee has been hired as a managing director in the South-East Asia team led by Shang-Wei Chow. Based in Singapore, she reports to Terence Leong, group head of South-East Asia.
Lee has over 17 years of wealth management experience, and joins from Bank of Singapore where she was managing director. Prior to Bank of Singapore, she was with ING Asia Private Bank, which was bought in 2009 by OCBC Bank from ING Group. She was previously a relationship manager at Citibank and had worked at HSBC in Shanghai.
Lee will be focusing on expanding the ultra high net worth segment, targeting entrepreneurs, business owners and families in the region.
Amundi selects new South Asia boss
Amundi has announced the appointment of Albert Tse as CEO of Amundi South Asia, taking over from Eric Bramoullé who is made head of marketing & products at Amundi and a member of the executive committee.
These appointments take effect from 1st November.
Tse was most recently head of distribution sales and marketing for Amundi in South Asia since 2019. Prior to joining Amundi, he was with Schroders, where he was head of the intermediary business of Southeast Asia and head of Malaysia & Thailand businesses.
Tse joined Schroders in 2003 as a member of the mutual funds retail sales team for Singapore. In 2008, he was promoted to head of intermediary distribution, Singapore and in 2010 he assumed wider responsibilities as head of the intermediary business, Southeast Asia. He was also responsible for business development with private banks in Asia from 2014 to 2017.
Bramoullé, has been with the group for 22 years and has held several positions at Amundi. He was most recently CEO of Amundi South Asia after being CEO at Amundi Austria from 2015 to 2018 and at Amundi Poland from 2013 to 2015.
Prior to this, Bramoullé was head of retail networks equity management from 2010 to 2013 and deputy head of equity fund management from 2007 to 2010 at Société Générale Asset Management. Before that, he was vice president of the investment risk & process control department for SBI funds management in India.
Zico AM up EAM business
Stephanie Nai, has joined Zico Asset Management, a Singapore-based private wealth manager, as an advisor.
Nai has 15 years of wealth management experience, including 12 years from the investment products side in various private banks such as UBS and Credit Suisse. Prior to joining Zico AM, she was a relationship manager at OCBC Premier Private Client.
Zico AM is part of Zico Holdings Ltd, an Asea focused, Catalist-listed, financial services group, and is a CMS licensed fund management platform for fund managers, and manager and advisor to high-net worth individuals and family office clients.
Endowus makes three new hires
Endowus, a Singapore MAS-licensed digital wealth platform, has reinforced its operations in Singapore, following the firm’s strategic fundraise from UBS, Singtel Innov8 and Samsung.
Dominic Ong joins as Endowus’ chief financial officer and head of strategic partnerships, Deepak Sarda as vice president of engineering and Valerie Tan as head of risk and compliance.
Ong’s responsibilities include helping to define and articulate the strategic objectives of the firm and developing relationships with investors and external partners other key stakeholders. He joins Endowus from Rayliant Global Advisors, a quantitative asset manager, where he was head of strategy and business development in Asia Pacific. Prior to that, he spent a decade at Standard Chartered Bank in Hong Kong and Singapore where he held several senior positions, including as head of a quantitative investment solutions (QIS) team.
Sarda joins Endowus with 17 years of experience in delivering greenfield software products and in his new role, he will be responsible for leading an engineering team in developing Endowus’ technology platform.
Previously, Sarda was at Amazon Web Services (AWS), where he was head of developer solutions architecture for Asean. Prior to this, he spent over a decade in financial services, including at JPMorgan Chase & Co, where he was the global lead for observability & chaos engineering services within the platform services group.
Tan has to decades of experience in the financial sector, and at Endowus she will be implementing governance and risk management frameworks associated with Endowus’ core business and expansion plans.
Prior to joining Endowus, Tan was most recently the head of process, control and governance for group wealth management at Standard Chartered Bank. Tan has also worked at Credit Suisse, DBS, JP Morgan Singapore and London and KPMG earlier in her career.
Ex-Blackrock COO moves to UBS AM
UBS Asset Management has named former Blackrock chief operating officer Alison Telfer as country head for Australia and New Zealand.
Telfer will start her new roles in January 2022, taking over from John Mowat who held the interim position.
Telfer was also Blackrock’s general counsel and head of public policy for Australasia, and executive sponsor for Blackrock Women’s Initiative Australasia and was a member of the firm’s Philanthropic Committee and Asia Pacific Stewardship Committee.
Prior to joining BlackRock in 2013, she served as senior legal counsel and later as a director, specialised product development and co-investment group at Challenger Limited. She started her career at King & Wood Mallesons.
Mowat will return to his previous role as head of UBS AM’s real estate business.
BNP Paribas WM poaches from Credit Suisse
Aditya Chauhan has been appointed Singapore-based head of NRI & international market for BNP Paribas Wealth Management.
Chauhan reports to David Lim, head of wealth management South-East Asia and will be responsible for driving the bank’s growth strategy in Singapore and Hong Kong.
An industry veteran, Aditya has held senior market roles at several international private banks and mostly recently at Credit Suisse, Singapore.
