Ernst Traun, the CEO Valartis Bank Austria, is to step down at the end of this month.

Ernst Traun, the chief executive of Valartis Bank Austria, is to step down at the end of this month and go back to focusing on client business and front-office activity.

Traun, who will relinquish his group executive management responsibilities, will hold the position of general representative after October. In this role he will “continue to make a valuable contribution to the expansion of the group-wide private banking business and help to drive forward the exploitation of group synergies in global marketing,” the firm said in a statement. Traun became CEO in April of last year.

From November the managing board of Valartis Bank Austria will comprise Andrew Hartnett and Monika Jung, the latter serving as spokesperson for the managing board.

The firm additionally announced that from the start of November it is reducing Valartis Group’s executive management line-up from five to four members: Gustav Stenbolt (group CEO), George Isliker (chief financial officer and chief risk officer), Vincenzo Di Pierri (CEO of Valartis Bank Switzerland) and Dr Andreas Insam (CEO of Valartis Bank Liechtenstein).

Meanwhile, Valartis also said that it is going to open a private banking subsidiary in Lugano in November.

Valartis expects to see continued growth in Italian assets and so decided to open a base in Italian-speaking Switzerland to be closer to this client base as part of its “Private Banking Plus” strategy, announced in 2008. The Lugano office adds to Valartis’ existing Swiss bases in Geneva and Zurich.

Significantly, in June Valartis named Di Pierri, an Italian-Swiss dual citizen as its new Swiss CEO, and the bank says that since his appointment the Italian market has become more of a focus.

Di Pierri started his banking career back in 1974 in foreign exchange trading at Credit Suisse. In the following 24 years, he worked for Credit Suisse and UBS in various management roles before joining HSBC Republic Bank Switzerland in 1998, being responsible for private banking in Zurich and Lugano. In 2003, he moved to the Zurich-based private bank Finter Bank, where he served as managing director and CEO until October 2011. He is currently chairman of the board of the Italian Chamber of Commerce for Switzerland.