A round-up of wealth management executive moves in the Asia-Pacific region.

Carret Private opened a new office in Singapore, led by former Indosuez Wealth Management banker Eugene Huang. At Indosuez, where he had worked since June 2017, Huang looked after North Asian clients. Previously, he worked at Merrill Lynch, Barclays and Nomura.

At JP Morgan Filippo Gori became deputy chief executive of Asia-Pacific, as part of a change in a number of executive roles (as reported elsewhere in moves summaries by this publication).

Barclays Private Bank hired private banking veteran Sandeep Das to head up private clients in India and support ultra-high net worth clients across the continent. He made the move after 27 years in private banking at Standard Chartered in India, where he held a series of senior positions in the areas of products and distribution, most recently as managing director and head of Standard Chartered's private banking arm. He also led client strategy for both onshore and non-resident Indian clients.

UBS global wealth management appointed Desmond Kuek as divisional vice chairman, based in Singapore. Kuek reports to Joe Stadler, the head of ultra-high net worth wealth management at the firm, and to Edmund Koh, president of UBS in Asia-Pacific. Over a career spanning more than 35 years, Kuek has held leadership positions in the corporate world, public sector and military; and most recently as president and group chief executive of Singapore Mass Rapid Transit Corporation. Prior to that, he held roles as Permanent Secretary at Singapore's Ministry of Environment and Water Resources, Chief of Army and Chief of Defence Force. Kuek also served on the boards of Singapore Technologies Engineering Ltd and its subsidiaries, Defence Science and Technology Agency, Housing and Development Board, Jurong Town Corporation, International Enterprise Singapore and the Civil Service College.

UBS’s co-head of wealth management for the Asia-Pacific region, August Hatecke, was named as country head of Singapore and head of the Singapore branch. In this new role, Hatecke reports to Edmund Koh, UBS president for the Asia-Pacific region. Hatecke relocated to Singapore in 2016 as head of wealth management for Southeast Asia. He held various leadership positions over the course of his 19-year career at UBS. Previously, he also served as head of ultra-high net worth business at the global family office for the Switzerland operation, based in Zurich.

The chairman and chief executive of National Australia Bank, which was singled out for criticism by a Royal Commission probing widespread failings in the country’s financial services sector, resigned. NAB’s chief executive, Andrew Thorburn, and chairman, Dr Ken Henry, left the bank. Following the issue of a report written by Kenneth Hayne, commissioner, the men locked horns over findings in the the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry.

Schroders announced that Japanese equity fund manager Masaki Taketsume formally took over managing the Schroder Tokyo Fund and the Schroder Japan Growth Fund Investment Trust. Taketsume has been at Schroders for more than a decade, and the move was part of deliberate succession planning to replace the veteran fund manager Andrew Rose who decided to retire from the industry at the end of June. Rose started his career at Schroders in 1981, during which time he had a number of roles, including senior investment officer for Japan and head of Japanese equities. 

Fitch Ratings appointed Matthew Ginsburg as chairman for the Asia-Pacific region. He took over from Bernard de Lattre, who has stepped down from the role. Reporting to Ian Linnell, President of Fitch Ratings, Ginsburg provides strategic oversight and direction to the Asia-Pacific team as part of a non-executive role.Originally from the US, Ginsburg has been based in Hong Kong since 1992. During his career he has held various senior management positions within sizeable businesses in Asia, most recently as head of investment banking, Asia-Pacific for Barclays, where he was also a member of the bank's global investment banking executive committee and its Asia-Pacific management committee.

BNP Paribas Asset Management, part of BNP Paribas, appointed Paul Sandhu as head of multi-assets quant solutions and client advisory Asia-Pacific. The role was a newly-formed one. Based in Hong Kong, Sandhu reports to Anton Wouters, head of solutions and client advisory. He leads the region’s MAQS team to enhance BNPP AM’s existing investment capacities in this space. He is also responsible for developing and the implementation of bespoke investment products.

DBS appointed Han Kwee Juan as group head of strategy and planning, taking the helm from Shee Tse Koon who became the bank’s Singapore country head last December. Han reports to chief executive Piyush Gupta and is a member of the group management committee. Prior to this, Han worked for 27 years at Citibank, leading various businesses including consumer banking, corporate banking and transaction banking. He was most recently CEO of Citi Singapore, a position he held since 2012. In that role, he had oversight of Citi’s onshore retail banking, wealth management, cards and personal loans, mortgage and retail SME businesses in Singapore.

US-based asset manager Russell Investments hired Ying Tan as president and general manager for Russell Investments Management (Shanghai). Ying Tan, brought more than 20 years of experience in wealth management, investment research and trading. She reports to chief executive, Asia-Pacific Pete Gunning. She replaced Brian Ingram. Ryan Fu, deputy general manager and chief compliance officer in Shanghai, had been acting as interim president and general manager following Ingram’s departure. Prior to joining the firm, Ying Tan spent more than a decade with Mercer, where she served as a principal in the firm’s Asian manager research capability and later as the head of the firm’s investment business in China. She played a major role in building Mercer’s investment advisory business in China.

Willis Towers Watson, the advisory, broking and solutions company, appointed Edwina Ho as investment director for its investments business in Asia. Based in Hong Kong, Ho works with the firm’s institutional clients across the Greater China market. Prior to this role, Ho was head of Legg Mason’s institutional business for Hong Kong and China. While in this role, she worked with major sovereign wealth funds, pension funds, insurance companies, family offices and asset and wealth managers. Ho has developed new investment activities, including being involved in China’s Belt and Road Initiative, and has established a partnership with the Hong Kong Monetary Authority Infrastructure Financing Facilitation Office. Prior to Legg Mason, she worked for China Everbright as head of institutional sales and was responsible for marketing and business development in offshore markets. She has also held senior positions at major global banks and consultancies, including Macquarie, Goldman Sachs and McKinsey.

Canaccord Genuity Wealth Management named Nick Teo as business development director in Singapore. Teo works  with Andy Finch, head of international sales at CGWM (UK) to develop and consolidate new and existing distribution opportunities in Singapore and see how to expand its offerings to more institutions and other intermediaries. Teo has worked in the financial services industry for over 15 years. Prior to joining CGWM (UK), he was the regional sales manager for Friends Provident and before that, sales manager for AXA.
 
A former chief investment officer for the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, the jurisdiction’s de facto central bank and regulator moved into the world of crypto-currencies and related technology. Yong Hak Huh joined the board of advisors for Xen Technologies. He has more than three decades of experience in the investment and merger and acquisition advisory space. Previously, he was CIO of private markets at the HKMA, managing a $25 billion alternative asset portfolio. 

The Asia-Pacific regional chief executive and chairman of Goldman Sachs, Ken Hitchner, retired from the firm. A former pilot in the US Navy, Hitchner was appointed as the bank’s president for Asia-Pacific, excluding Japan, in 2013 and was named the region’s chairman and chief executive officer in 2017. He joined Goldman in 1991.

One of the top executives for Credit Suisse’s private bank in Asia, Christian Huber, head to to the bank’s home country of Switzerland to take up another top role. Huber joined Credit Suisse’s Swiss Universal Bank division as the new chief operating officer of the private and wealth management clients business. He reports to Serge Fehr, head of private wealth management clients at the Swiss Universal Bank, Credit Suisse.

Huber, who has been with the bank for two decades, left Asia after having worked in senior roles in Tokyo and Singapore for the past 12 years. Most recently, he was COO of the lender’s private banking franchise in Asia. He was also a member of Credit Suisse’s central COO/CFO organisation based in Switzerland.

Alain Bernasconi, COO for private banking in South Asia and COO of the Singapore location for private banking, took up Huber’s COO role for Asia. Bernasconi reports to Francois Monnet, head of private banking for North Asia as the primary manager, with another reporting line to Benjamin Cavalli, head of private banking for South Asia, and Chien Chien Wong, chief operating officer of the APAC division. Bernasconi is an 18-year veteran of Credit Suisse and has been in Singapore in total for eight years in different roles.

PineBridge Investments appointed Anthony Fasso as its new Asia-Pacific chief executive. He took over from Rajeev Mittal, who left the company in December last year. Fasso, who is based in Hong Kong, reports to PineBridge CEO, Greg Ehret. With more than 30 years in the financial services sector, Fasso has worked for almost a quarter of a century in Asia’s asset management business. Most recently, he spent eight years as CEO of AMP Capital Investors’ international business and was head of the firm’s global clients division, based in Hong Kong. 

Zurich-based additiv, a digital wealth management firm, hired Bert-Jan van Essen, former chief technology officer at Privé Technologies, founder of Dragon Wealth and former Asia-Pacific private banking chief information officer at Credit Suisse. He assumed the role of managing director additiv Asia on 1 April. Bert-Jan leads a team of sales, product and delivery managers in Singapore and Vietnam to continue the firm’s growth drive in the region where it has tripled its staff in the past 12 months. Van Essen succeeded Thomas Achhorner who focuses on developing strategic markets, after having opened the organisation’s development centre in Vietnam, the recruitment of senior talent from key competitors and the recent launch of a wealth app for the Indonesian arm of Australia’s largest bank.

Zurich Malaysia appointed Mukesh Dhawan as the chief executive of its Zurich Takaful Malaysia Berhad business. He took the helm from Salim Majid Zain, who left the company in January, and reports to ZTMB’s board. Dhawan has more than 18 years of experience in the life insurance sector across the Asia-Pacific region. His most recent business title was that of head of market management and general manager, Zurich Life Insurance Malaysia Berhad. He joined Zurich Life Insurance Malaysia Berhad (ZLIMB) in January 2015. He has been in various senior management and strategic posts in accident and health profit centre management, strategic marketing, product management, as well as distribution management in leading organisations such as Prudential Corporation Asia, AIG and AIA. Prior to joining Zurich, he was based in Singapore with the AIA regional team driving its Premier Agency strategies within the South East Asian markets.