Credit Suisse to hire hundreds of private bankers
Brady Dougan, chief executive of Credit Suisse, was bullish on the bank's growth driven by its wealth management business at a conference in London yesterday. He said the bank would use its strong position to hire hundreds of private bankers and acquire in the wealth management space.
Dougan said via a webcast at the Merrill Lynch Banking and Insurance CEO conference last night, that the Swiss bank's private banking arm had benefited from strong net new assets despite volatile market conditions in the third quarter of this year.
Dougan said he wants to hire another thousand-odd relationship managers by 2010 globally, bringing the headcount to 4,100. The bank had 3,140 relationship managers at the end of last year.
He added the bank was readying to acquire in the wealth management segment, and has picked up talented bankers from struggling competitors.
It also plans to launch a Japan and Mexico-based onshore business within the next few months and wll continue to grow in the US and Eastern Europe and Russia.
Despite the bank's assets under management in wealth management falling CHF65bn to CHF774bn between the end of last year and June, the bank's net new assets growth was up marginally to 7% from last year.
"The business has been resilient, despite the market's dislocation," he said, commenting on the general bank.
He added the bank had benefited from the effects of the liquidity crisis: "There are fewer market participants. The opportunities for those who remain will be stronger than ever. Credit Suisse will be among them."
Dougan said he did not believe the Swiss government would need to rescue its banks in the way other countries around Europe had. He said Credit Suisse's balance sheet was strong enough to withstand even this leg of the crisis.
"My hope would be that we wouldn't have to have those kind of arrangements and that the capital of Swiss banks is strong enough," Dougan said. "That is certainly the case with Credit Suisse."
To see the full report go to http://www.credit-suisse.com/investors/doc/ml_banking_conference_brady_081008.pdf
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