Asia Pacific continues to lead the way appointment wise. Elsewhere, the US regulator issues a fine and the European industry calls out sales process restrictions.
Deutsche Bank has appointed former Credit Suisse banker Eleanor Lam as managing director and market head for Southeast Asia in the International Private Bank.
Based in Singapore, Lam will report to Johanes Oeni, head of IPB, South-east Asia. She will be responsible for managing and acquiring the private and corporate portfolios of ultra-high-net-worth individuals, entrepreneurs, and their families in the region. Lam joins Deutsche Bank with over 24 years of industry experience, most recently at Credit Suisse where she was a senior client partner in Singapore market. Prior to that, she spent nine years at UBS.
The RIS is a very complex file and many of the rules have the potential for a rather disruptive effect on the sales process - Thomas Wulf, Eusipa
Chirag Doshi has been appointed as chief investment officer (CIO), fixed income at LGT Wealth India in Mumbai, according to a spokesperson from the bank. In this newly-created role, he reports to Rajesh Cheruvu, managing director & CIO at LGT Wealth India. The wealth manager is seeking to leverage Doshi’s knowledge and expertise in fixed income markets, including investment strategy formulation, bond ideation, active portfolio management, and corporate treasury management, said Cheruvu.
The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (Finra) has imposed a US$350,000 fine on Charles Schwab & Co. Inc. for failing to fully disclose information about exchange-traded notes (ETNs) to thousands of customers over a period of almost five years. From January 2016 to December 2020, Schwab sent trade confirmations to 765,000 clients that did not disclose that the ETNs had a callable feature and that early redemption of the notes could affect their potential returns. As a result, Schwab violated industry rules around disclosure, according to the US regulator.
In Europe, proposals surrounding a limited inducement ban, pricing benchmarks, ‘best-interest’ tests and unfeasible timeline have led several European associations releasing a joint statement on 6 June to voice their initial concerns. SRP caught up with Thomas Wulf (pictured), secretary general of the European Structured Investment Products Association (Eusipa), one of the associations involved, to go through the main sticking points.
“The RIS is a very complex file and many of the rules have the potential for a rather disruptive effect on the sales process,” said Wulf.
Many aspects related to the Mifid regime, such as the value-for-money testing, product pricing against new European Securities and Markets Authority (Esma) benchmarks, the introduction of a limited inducement ban, and the cumulative impact of these rules, are a cause for concern, according to Wulf.
“It is difficult to see how all this is going to help the investor to get better access to capital market products,” he said.
In better news, structured products continue to meet the needs of a broad range of investors in the UK, according to the results from a recent consumer research released by the UK Structured Products Association (UKSPA).
“This independent survey of over 2,000+ retail investors, clearly demonstrates that across the spectrum of retail investors, from basic to sophisticated levels of knowledge and experience, the risk of losing capital in their investments remains a huge consideration,” chairman Zak de Mariveles told SRP.
Over the past seven years, the survey results show there has been a general increase in the number of investors holding structured products as part of their portfolio, from one in five investors in 2017 to almost one in four investors in 2023. Over the same period, holdings of other types of investment have remained relatively consistent or fallen, according to the research.
Morningstar has licensed the new Morningstar Eurozone Societal Development Select 80 Index to HSBC which will use it on an exclusive basis as the underlying of index-based structured products.
The latest addition to Morningstar’s sustainability index range is powered by Morningstar Indexes and draws on ESG data and risk ratings supplied by Morningstar Sustainalytics.
The Morningstar Eurozone Societal Development Select 80 Index provides investors with exposure to large- and mid-cap eurozone-based companies that display a stronger commitment to policies that are aligned with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals and support economic development in emerging market countries with the lowest levels of economic development according to the World Bank and the United Nations.
Image: iStockphoto.