Barclays hires Jorge Munoz for Asia ECM role

Jorge Munoz, Deutsche Bank's equity syndicate head for Asia who was due to leave the region in the next couple of weeks for a similar role at Deutsche in Europe, has decided to leave the firm altogether and join Barclays Capital instead.

Sources say Barclays has snapped up Munoz for its equity capital markets team in Asia, which it is in the process of building. The UK bank is making a strong push into equities in Asia to match its US presence in this asset class that it gained when it bought Lehman Brothers' American operations at the end of 2008. Barclays has had an ECM team in Asia before, but it has primarily been focused on convertible bonds. Munoz is the first banker hired to focus on traditional ECM business such as origination of initial public offerings and placements.

Munoz will be based in Hong Kong and will have some form of leadership role in the expanding ECM team, although it is unclear what his exact title will be. According to sources, he will be a managing director and will report directly to Matthew Ginsburg, the head of investment banking for Asia-Pacific who joined Barclays in September last year from Morgan Stanley. He will also have a second reporting line to Sam Dean in London and David Erickson in New York, who are co-heads of global equity capital markets. Barclays declined to comment.

Munoz has been an ECM banker with Deutsche Bank for nine years, the last six in Asia. He joined the bank in London in 2001. Before that he worked in ECM at Salomon Smith Barney, also in London.

He was set to return to London shortly to become head of equity syndicate for Europe, a role that Deutsche will now have to fill by other means.

Munoz's replacement as head of equity syndicate for Asia, is already in place, however. The new head, Sumeet Puri, joined Deutsche in February from Morgan Stanley in India and has been working alongside Munoz ever since. Syndication is a familiar role for Puri who was previously head of Asia execution and syndication at Merrill Lynch in Hong Kong. He transferred to Merrill's India subsidiary DSP Merrill Lynch in Mumbai in early 2007 to take up a new dual position as head of ECM and head of structured origination for India, but left within six months of his transfer to instead help Morgan Stanley build its equities business in India as head of the ECM team at that bank.

It is unclear why Munoz has decided to stay in Asia, although the fact that he will have a wider role within ECM at Barclays -- as opposed to his syndicate role at Deutsche -- would have been a tempting proposition. Barclays is also putting significant resources into this part of the bank and is said to be willing to pay quite a lot to get the necessary talent in place as it expands its franchise. Previously, Barclays was primarily focused on fixed income-related products in the areas of financing and risk management, as well as strategic advisory and some equity-related derivatives businesses.