Deutsche Bank’s head of Asia-Pacific insurance research, Bob Leung, has jumped ship to UBS to lead regional insurance research. He started at the Swiss bank’s Hong Kong office earlier this week and reports to Damien Horth. A Deutsche spokesperson confirmed that Leung was until recently at the German bank and did not comment on who had been appointed to replace him.
Leung has spent his career in financial services. Before joining Deutsche he worked in Citi’s investment research team in Hong Kong. He has also worked with Merrill Lynch and as an actuarial analyst at Tillinghast Towers Perrin Actuaries.
At UBS, Leung will be the lead analyst for coverage of the insurance industry in Hong Kong and China. He will also lead insurance coverage across the Asia-Pacific region, working closely with both the regional banks team at UBS, led by Stephen Andrews, and the Swiss bank’s insurance analysts across the region. These include Justin Kim in Korea; Pandora Lee in Taiwan; James Coghill in Australia; Aya Fujiki in Japan; and Joshua Zhao in Mainland China. Leung will also be a key contributor to the bank’s global insurance product, which is led by Andrew Kligerman out of the US, UBS said in an internal memo that FinanceAsia has seen.
Meanwhile, John Chan has also joined UBS as an associate in the same team, reporting to Leung. He joins from insurer Blue Shield of California, where he was a senior actuarial analyst. He has also worked for Zurich Life in Hong Kong and Stokbot Network in Australia.
The large number of initial public offerings by insurance companies has created substantial and continuing buy-side interest in stocks of insurance companies. Estimates suggest that the market capitalisation of listed insurance companies across the region is more than $350 billion. The appointments “demonstrate our continuing commitment to research excellence for this important sector, particularly in the critical HK/China market”, the memo added.
