London: HSBC Holdings Plc detailed a new structure for its investment-banking unit after it merged the business with its corporate bank and brought in Matthew Westerman from Goldman Sachs Group Inc to help lead it.
The firm created a corporate, financials and multinationals banking group, led by Philippe Henry, to combine the lending and transaction-banking units, Westerman and co-head Robin Phillips said Monday in a memo to staff obtained by Bloomberg News. The investment bank also started a structured-finance joint venture with the trading division, run by Kevin Godfrey.
Global Banking and Markets chief executive officer Samir Assaf has reorganised the business amid pressure to cut costs and win more fees from its biggest clients. Some senior bankers have left in recent weeks as HSBC eliminates duplicate roles from the combination of the corporate and investment bank units, a person with knowledge of the matter said last month.
“The environment around us is changing, and we must adapt,” the co-heads wrote in the memo. The new structure will “support our ambition of becoming a consistent top three strategic banking partner to our clients.”
