Credit Suisse makes China hire

Credit Suisse has appointed Jeremy Xiao as a managing director of its investment banking department in China. The hire comes as the bank expects a healthy pipeline of capital markets deals in China.

Xiao, who will begin work at the bank's Beijing securities representative office in November, was previously a managing partner and joint global equity capital markets head at the Herbert Smith law firm in Beijing.

In his new job, Xiao will deal with some of Credit Suisse's largest clients in China, with a particular focus on the energy and telecoms sectors. He will report to Paul Raphael, Credit SuisseÆs head of investment banking in Asia, and Zhang Liping, the bank's chairman and head of investment banking for China.

Xiao was one of the foreign lawyer pioneers in the Chinese capital markets and has advised on more than a hundred initial public offerings and M&A transactions so far. He specialises in corporate and corporate finance work in Hong Kong and China, and is considered a leading practitioner of restructuring, mergers and acquisitions and IPOs for Chinese companies.

On the M&A side, he advised Central Huijin Investment on it $7.5 billion sale of Bank of China shares to international investors. He was also involved in the $22 billion IPO of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, the $9.2 billion IPO for China Construction Bank Hong Kong and the $3.4 billion listing of Sinopec in New York, Hong Kong and London.

After running the IPOs for two of ChinaÆs big four national banks - China Construction Bank in 2005 and ICBC last year - Credit Suisse has completed a number of Chinese listings this year, including the $1.27 billion IPO for shoemaker and retailer Belle International Holdings, the $213 million IPO of the drug research company Wuxi PharmaTech and the just completed $467 million IPO for China Aoyuan Property Group. According to the bankÆs own estimates it has raised more money for Chinese enterprises in the international equity market than any other international investment bank over the past two years.