Weekly roundup of people news, Jan 26
PRUDENTIAL HIRES NEW DIRECTOR OF INVESTMENTS
UK life insurer Prudential Corporation Asia (PCA) has hired Nancy Kong from PineBridge Investments as director on the insurance investments team.
She is based in Hong Kong and reports to Stephan Van Vliet, chief investment officer for Asia Pacific, a spokeswoman said. Van Vliet had also worked at PineBridge prior to joining PCA in May last year.
Kong started with PCA in October, according to her LinkedIn page. The insurer declined to comment on the starting date, Kong's role responsibilities and whether she replaced anyone.
Kong’s appointment comes after Prudential underwent a reorganisation of its Asia investment team in late 2016 and early 2017 by bringing in new CIOs for its main markets, including Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia, as well as for the Apac region as a whole.
She was most recently vice-president of insurance asset management at PineBridge. Her last day was October 27 and the Asia business development team will continue to cover the insurance asset management segment, a PineBridge spokeswoman said. The spokeswoman did not say whether a replacement had been found.
FUNDNEL HIRES HEAD OF INVESTMENTS DEVELOPMENT
Singaporean private investment platform Fundnel has appointed Carlos Camacho as head of investments development, a spokesman confirmed.
Effective December 1, Singapore-based Camacho, who reports to chief executive Kelvin Lee, leads deal syndication efforts and helps with deal origination and building and maintaining Fundnel’s investor base, the spokesman said.
The role is newly created to build out Fundnel’s deal syndication mechanism and channels and to establish a deal origination pipeline from previously untapped geographies and partnerships, added the spokesman.
Camacho most recently completed an MBA from Columbia Business School, before which he was a manager for the wholesale distribution team at Columbia Threadneedle Investments.
Fundnel’s private investment platform offers unlisted securities in growth and pre-IPO stage companies to private equity investors, venture capital funds, family offices, corporate ventures, and angel investor networks, as well as individually accredited investors.
DEUTSCHE BANK WM ADDS THREE TO BOOST NRI COVERAGE
Deutsche Bank Wealth Management (WM) has hired three managing directors in Singapore to cover non-resident Indian (NRI) clients as part of Deutsche Bank WM’s global South Asia business.
Rasik Ahuja joined on January 16 from UBP where he had been desk head for NRI and South Asia, since 2014. UBP declined to comment on the departure.
Sagar Sapra joined on January 2 from Standard Chartered Bank where he was principal director since 2011.Standard Chartered did not respond to AsianInvestor’s queries by press time.
Swapnil Mishra joined on December 4 from BSI Bank, where he was deputy head of the global South Asia business for eight years.
An EFG spokesperson declined to comment on the departure. EFG International completed the acquisition of BSI Bank in November 2016.
All three relationship managers report to Amrit Singh, head of WM coverage for the global South Asia business at Deutsche Bank WM.
Singh said that there will be another 10 hires joining the wealth management team in Singapore and Dubai in the first quarter of 2018 to boost the global South Asia business.
EASTSPRING NAMES MULTI-ASSET SOLUTIONS CIO
Eastspring Investments, the asset management arm of Prudential Corporation Asia, has appointed Colin Graham as chief investment officer of multi-asset solutions.
Effective January 15, Graham leads the multi-asset solutions team, overseeing investment and portfolio strategy. He is based in Singapore and reports to Virginie Maisonneuve, Eastspring CIO.
The role is newly created, though Eastspring declined to comment on who led the multi-asset solutions team prior to his appointment.
Most recently, Graham was CIO of multi asset solutions at BNP Paribas Asset Management in London. After his departure, the multi asset-solutions team was placed under the new multi-asset, quantitative and solutions (MAQS) investment group in November 2017, led by Denis Panel, chief executive of MAQS, a spokesman said.
KPMG APPOINTS INSURANCE AND WEALTH STRATEGY HEAD FOR AUSTRALIA
KPMG Australia has appointed Tim Thomas to lead the insurance and wealth management strategy practice in the firm’s global strategy group.
Thomas joins from Prudential Financial of US, where he was regional vice-president and managed strategy and corporate development for the Asia Pacific.
He is joined at KPMG Australia by Maurice van den Heuval, who has moved from KPMG Netherlands’ insurance strategy practice and will be a senior leader in Tim’s team.
Neither KPMG Australia nor Prudential Financial responded to queries from AsianInvestor by press time.
HERMES IM ADDS TO EMERGING MARKETS TEAM
UK asset manager Hermes Investment Management has named Amit Mehta director and senior Asia analyst in its emerging markets team.
Mehta works with the team to manage Asian stocks in the portfolio, as well as providing research and analysis on existing and future areas of investment.
The London-based appointment took effect on January 22, a Hermes spokesman said, and Mehta reports to head of emerging markets and lead portfolio manager Gary Greenberg.
AsianInvestor was unable to ascertain Mehta's last place of employment, but a LinkedIn page shows he was most recently a fintech mentor at Startupbootcamp FinTech in London. Prior that he held a number of senior roles with Pimco, Pictet Asset Management, Insight Investment and Morgan Stanley.
MAYER BROWN ADDS SINGAPORE PARTNERS
Legal firm Mayer Brown JSM has announced an expansion of its banking and finance team with the addition of two new partners in Singapore.
Kayal Sachi and Ian Roebuck, who join from Allen and Overy, will focus on acquisition and leveraged finance, event-driven finance, corporate lending and restructuring transactions in South east Asia and India on behalf of regional and global financial institutions, corporates, private equity funds and debt funds.
Sachi, who joined in December, was partner at Allen and Overy, while Roebuck, who joined on January 15, was a banking counsel.
Allen and Overy did not respond to AsianInvestor’s queries by press time.
Other people news reported by AsianInvestor in the past week: