People moves: Societe Generale makes senior changes, Mattatia moves to BNP Paribas, and more

Latest job changes across the industry

Richard Quessette: leaving Societe Generale

Richard Quessette, head of equity and equity derivatives for global markets, is leaving Societe Generale to pursue his career outside the group, a spokesperson confirms.

Alexandre Fleury has been named as Quessette’s replacement, effective as of June 1. He will be based in Paris, reporting to Frank Drouet, head of global markets, Societe Generale said.

Fleury was most recently global head of equities structured products and structured financing at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Prior to that, he held roles at Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse, and also previously spent 10 years at Societe Generale, based in Tokyo, New York and Paris, with responsibilities in structured equity derivatives trading and structured credit derivatives trading.

Thomas Decouvelaere

Thomas Decouvelaere is set to become head of financial engineering for global markets, Asia-Pacific at SG, from July 1.

Decouvelaere is succeeding Jerome Niddam, recently promoted to head of global markets for Asia-Pacific. He will be based in Hong Kong and will report to Niddam locally and functionally to Marc Saffon, head of financial engineering for global markets.

Decouvelaere has worked as head of pricing for European fixed income since 2013. He has also served as head of corporate pricing within the cross-asset solutions team, and a structurer in the fixed-income and currencies division.

SG has also reshuffled senior management under chief executive officer Frédéric Oudéa, who is set to continue for a further four-
year term.

Oudéa’s four deputy CEOs are: Diony Lebot, in charge of control functions, including risk, finance and compliance; Philippe Aymerich, who will handle French retail banking activities; Séverin Cabannes, who takes over supervision of the global banking and investor solutions activities; and Philippe Heim, who will deal with international retail banking activities, financial services and insurance.

Bernardo Sanchez Incera, previously deputy CEO in charge of retail banking, will leave the bank.

Sylvie Rémond, previously co-head of coverage and investment banking at SG, has been appointed group chief risk officer. William Kadouch-Chassaing, head of group strategy, becomes group chief financial officer, and Françoise Mercadal-Delasalles is promoted to CEO of Crédit du Nord from his previous role as deputy CEO.

---

Stephane Mattatia, a Paris-based equity derivatives structuring veteran who left Societe Generale in April, is joining fellow French bank BNP Paribas, say sources familiar with the situation.

Stephane Mattatia

Mattatia, who was most recently global head of product strategy for equities and derivatives at SG, is expected to join BNPP’s equity derivatives division in Paris this summer, the sources say.

Earlier this year, Nicolas Marque, global equity derivatives head at BNPP, relocated from London to Paris to continue running that division.

A spokesperson at BNP Paribas declined to comment.

The bank is also hiring Talat Sami as client solutions relationship manager within its prime solutions and financing division for Europe, Middle East and Africa (Emea), it said in a statement. He will be based in London, reporting to Kirsty Gurr, head of Emea client solutions.

Sami most recently worked as a client executive in Citi’s derivatives execution, clearing and collateral team, where he was a vice-president.

---

Pablo Salame, vice-chairman of Goldman Sachs and global co-head of the securities division, and Isabelle Ealet, also global co-head of the securities division, are to stand down from day-to-day operations at the company in June. Both will then become senior directors.

Salame joined in 1996 and became co-head of the global emerging markets debt group in 2000. He then moved to London, holding senior positions in global credit and European equities. He took up his current role in 2008, later returning to New York.

At Goldman, Ealet has played a role in building the commodities business, helping to establish the global franchise in physical and derivatives trading. Previously, she was global head of commodities. Ealet joined Goldman as a commodities trader in 1991.

Kostas Pantazopoulos

Also at Goldman, Kostas Pantazopoulos, global head of risk management strategies for the securities division, has decided to retire, according to a source close to the company. He is set to become an advisory director.

Pantazopoulos started at Goldman Sachs in 1998, working in fixed-income research in New York. He then moved to London, where he became global head of interest rate products in 2008 and then assumed extra responsibility for the Asia macro businesses in 2012, before taking up his current role in 2017.

---

Citi’s head of European interest rate sales, Cedric Pauwels, has been appointed to run its prime, futures and securities services (PFSS) business for North America. The move was announced in an internal memo, seen by Risk.net.

Pauwels joined Citi from Lehman Brothers in 2008, and was appointed head of European rates sales in 2010, later adding credit and securitised markets to his role.

Ben Travers will lead G10 rates sales for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

---

Martin Evans, European head of linear corporate and special situations trading within equity derivatives at Deutsche Bank, has left the bank, according to a source familiar with the matter.

Evans ended his 16-year career at Deutsche in April, and is currently seeking new opportunities, according to his LinkedIn profile. His previous positions listed include deputy head of credit investments for the treasury at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

James Lailey, head of North American securities lending at Deutsche Bank, has also left, a source says. He is listed as seeking employment in securities lending on his LinkedIn profile.

His previous roles have included head of North American securities lending supply, head of international securities lending, and vice-president of securities lending supply at Deutsche.

Senior Deutsche Bank rates trader Kal El-Wahab is moving to hedge fund Eisler Capital, Risk.net understands. This follows a similar move by Sam Wisnia, previously head of rates and foreign exchange at Deutsche, who started at Eisler as deputy chief investment officer in April.

El-Wahab is due to take up his new position at Eisler in the summer.

---

Citi has expanded the role of Thomas Treadwell, naming him head of over-the-counter clearing for Emea in addition to his current responsibilities as Asia-Pacific head of OTC clearing. He will be relocating to London.

Thomas Treadwell

Treadwell, who has more than 15 years’ OTC derivatives experience, has worked at Citi for more than seven years. Previously, he worked at Barclays and Lehman Brothers. While at Citi, he has contributed to building the OTC clearing franchise of the futures, clearing and collateral management (FCC) business, the bank said.

The business, headed by Jerome Kemp globally, made some senior hires in 2017 including Sabrina Wilson, who joined from Deutsche Bank as Emea head of FCC and global head of electronic trading for listed derivatives, and Jason Massey, moving to Citi from Morgan Stanley to take up the role of Emea head of sales for FCC.

Treadwell will continue to report to Chris Perkins, global head of OTC clearing globally, and Ian Nissen for Asia-Pacific, and will also report to Wilson, a Citi spokesperson says.

---

Kevin Alexander has been appointed deputy chief executive officer and head of global markets for the Americas at Natixis. He will continue reporting to Stephane About, CEO of Natixis Corporate & Investment Banking Americas. In his expanded role, he will oversee the growth of the Natixis CIB Americas platform.

Previously, Alexander served as head of investment banking and global markets Americas, and has held several positions within Natixis and its predecessors. He joined CDC Capital in 1999 to help develop the interest rate derivatives marketing and securitisation swaps effort.

---

Barclays has hired John Clements as managing director and head of US collateralised loan obligation (CLO) origination and syndication, according to a source close to the company. Previously, Clements was at Citi for 15 years, where he co-led the bank’s primary CLO business, the source says.

Clements’ hire follows the recent appointment of Mike Hopson and Lorraine Medvecky as managing directors to establish a new middle-market CLO business, with both moving from Natixis Capital.  

At the end of March, Barclays also hired three senior emerging market credit traders: Tolga Kirby from BNP Paribas, to cover Turkey; Carlos Rijo from Credit Suisse, to focus on Latin America high-grade corporates; and Alan Kao, to focus on China high-yield credit.

Barclays declined to comment.

---

Jonathan Hill, a former UK representative at the European Commission, has joined UBS as senior adviser to corporate clients, the bank said in a statement.

Jonathan Hill

Hill resigned from his position as the European Commissioner for Financial Stability, Financial Services and the Capital Markets Union soon after the UK voted in 2016 to leave the European Union. That role, as well as his experience as a government minister, mean “he is one of the very few people who can interpret politics in both the EU and the UK at a moment when businesses around the world are keen to know what recent developments might mean for them”, UBS said.

Last year, Hill co-founded Prosperity UK, which brings together leaders from business, universities and policy-making to look at Britain’s future outside of the EU.  

---

Steve Weller has been named chief executive of the Middle East and North Africa region for Saxo Bank, the firm said in a statement. He will be based in the Dubai office, reporting to Damian Bunce, chief client officer of Saxo Bank.

Previously, Weller was global head of Sberbank’s foreign exchange business. Before that he was head of Asia-Pacific foreign exchange at Barclays, based in Singapore, and global head of forex spot and forward trading at Lehman Brothers.

---

Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing has appointed Laura Cha May-Lung as the next chair of the board, marking the first time a woman has held the position at the stock exchange operator.

Her appointment is subject to written approval by the chief executive of the Hong Kong special administrative region. HKEX said a further announcement will be made once the approval is obtained. Cha will serve as chair for the next two years, a period coinciding with the remainder of her term as a director on the HKEX board.

She replaces CK Chow, who retires as chairman at the end of his term. At the same time, Cha will succeed Chow as a director of London Metal Exchange.  

---

HKEX has also made Roland Chai group risk officer, it said in a statement.

Chai will report to HKEX chief executive Charles Li, and will be responsible for group credit and quantitative analysis, enterprise risk management, and HKEX’s corporate information security office.

---

Michael Amakye has joined clearing house LCH’s CDSClear service as head of credit default swap sales. Based in London, he reports to Phil Atkinson, global head of sales and relationship management, and Frank Soussan, global head of CDSClear. Amakye’s most recent position was director for CDS business development at Ice Clear Europe from 2011.

---

Paul MacGregor started at brokerage house Berkeley Futures in May, handling derivatives sales. Based in London, he reports to Mark Quinn, senior associate director at Berkeley Futures.

Previously, MacGregor was head of sales at London Metal Exchange between October 2014 and January 2018.