The two moves are designed to make the most of GallagherÆs and RaphaelÆs specific expertise as the Swiss bank ramps up its investment banking coverage further, following more than two years of strong growth that have started to pay off in the form of big mandates.
Gallagher will continue to be based in Hong Kong and Raphael, who is currently co-head of the bankÆs global markets solutions group in Europe, will join him here in June, rounding off a leadership team within investment banking, capital markets and structured products that also includes Vikram Malhotra, head of the global markets solutions group in Asia-Pacific.
ôVik, Joe and Paul will work together with our country heads to develop the opportunities arising from the renaissance of growth that we are seeing on all fronts,ö says Eric Varvel, Credit SuisseÆs global co-head of investment banking. ôWe are seeing more cross-border and financial sponsor M&A flows, Japanese companies are becoming more active in non-Japan Asia, the equity-linked sector is booming and middle market companies are moving into high yield and structured products. We want to put more resources behind all of these areas.ö
He continues: ôCredit Suisse has done a good job of exploiting our areas of strength in China, Southeast Asia and Australia in the past few years and we now think it is the right time to bring in additional skill sets and look deeper and more aggressively at the markets.ö
Among the opportunities, he says, are the second-tier companies in China, Indonesia, Malaysia, India and even Vietnam, that are now starting to access both the capital markets and structured products space.
Credit Suisse is planning to add to its Asia-Pacific investment banking teams below the top level by bringing more talent from both Europe and the US and by making external hires, he says. In March, the bank re-hired Derek Armstrong from Goldman Sachs as head of a new debt financing group (comprising debt capital markets, leveraged finance and structured lending) and last month Ronald Leung re-joined the firm to head up its convertible bond business after stints at the CB desks of ABN AMRO and UBS.
M&A is one particular area that it wants to aggressively expand globally and in his new Pan-Asia Pacific role, Gallagher will be responsible for driving that business in this region. He will be working with Colin Banfield and Ronnie Behar in Non-Japan Asia, Kaoru Koyano in Japan and Rob Stewart in Australia and New Zealand.
Gallagher has over 20 years of experience in both investment banking and asset management. When he first joined its predecessor Credit Suisse First Boston in New York in 1985, it was in as an investment banker specialising in financial institutions and M&A.
During his time as head of the Asia Pacific ex-Japan investment banking department, Credit Suisse acted as joint bookrunner for the record-breaking IPOs of both China Construction Bank and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, making it the only international bank that has completed two state-owned Chinese bank privatisations so far.
The bank has also advised on several important M&A deals in the region in so far this year, including Wal-Mart StoresÆ acquisition of Trust-Mart stores in China and Bumi ResourcesÆ sale of a 30% stake in PT Kaltim Prima Coal, PT Arutmin Indonesia and related coal companies to IndiaÆs Tata Power for US$1.3 billion.
Rafael, meanwhile, has been one of the key drivers of Credit SuisseÆs capital markets and structured products business in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. During his three years as co-head of the global markets solutions group for Europe he has particularly focused on equity, equity-linked and equity derivatives products, leaving his co-head to look after the fixed-income and leveraged finance side of the business.
Over the past year, he has also assumed the role of head of emerging markets coverage in EMEA, adding to his previous emerging markets expertise from Latin America and Eastern Europe.
During his tenure, the European ECM team led the $2.3 billion IPO for KazMunaiGaz last year, which is the largest ever IPO out of Kazakhstan. It was also involved in the US$8.8 billion capital increase for Russia's Sberbank and the largest ever Sukuk convertible offering for Aldar Properties at US$2bn û both earlier this year.
ôOver the past two-and-a-half years Raphael has managed to more than double our European equity, equity-linked and equities derivatives business. On a global basis he is one of our stars,ö Varvel says.
Before joining Credit Suisse in 2004, Raphael was head of French investment banking at Merrill Lynch. He has spent much of his 20-year investment banking career, which also includes work for Salomon Brothers, in developing markets and is fluent in English, French, Spanish, Portuguese and Arabic.
According to Dealogic, Credit Suisse ranks fourth in the league table for completed M&A in Asia ex-Japan so far this year, up from ninth last year. In ECM it is ninth this year, after the ICBC IPO helped lift it to fourth place last year.
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