Calyon adds new DCM head

Calyon has hired Swaroop Patel to head its debt and credit markets team for Asia ex-Japan, replacing Antoine Gros, who is being moved to Paris to become global co-head of securitisation.

Patel will be based in Hong Kong and will be responsible for managing origination, sales and trading of the bank's debt and credit products. He will report to Frederic Laine, head of fixed income markets for Asia ex-Japan, and Jim Siracusa, global head of debt and credit markets.

"[Swaroop] has a history of being at the forefront of the development of Asia's debt and credit markets, and he brings the expertise and depth of experience necessary to assist us to develop a strong debt capital raising platform for our clients in Asia," says Laine.

Patel has worked in Asia's credit markets since arriving in Hong Kong in 1997 and during that time he has worked at J.P. Morgan, ABN AMRO and Bank of America. At Bank of America, which was his last banking job, he was responsible for syndicated loans, leveraged finance and debt capital markets in addition to overseeing a $150 million loan trading book.

He was axed from his role at BoA in January 2008 as part of a round of lay-offs and was most recently working at Samena Capital, a Bahrain-headquartered investment management group that was founded in February 2008 - although his position at Samena was not mentioned in Calyon's official announcement, which said that he was "most recently" at BoA.

"We are confident that Swaroop will excel in leading the Asia ex-Japan DCM team, based on his track record of success," said Siracusa in the announcement. "His leadership will further enable us to build out our DCM franchise in Asia ex-Japan and will help continue our commitment to growing our full range of capital markets capabilities in Asia."