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Julius Baer Intensifies Asia Strategy With Japan-Related Hires
Tom Burroughes
3 November 2015
Switzerland-listed private banking group took another move to stress the importance of its Asia strategy by hiring a team head for its newly-created Japan desk in Singapore. It also added to the business development team of an asset management business, in which it has a stake, in Tokyo. Before he joined Julius Baer, Mizuguchi was director of the Japan international team of Credit Suisse in Singapore from 2012 to 2015. Before that, he had been executive director of the private banking department at Nomura Securities for seven years and held various senior roles at the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, respectively. Hofer was also the main author of the Julius Baer Wealth Report: Asia, now in its fifth year (see the latest report here.)
The bank has appointed Takuma Mizuguchi to the team head position. In this new role, he will drive the bank’s Japan coverage out of Singapore to “serve some of the most sophisticated clients in the region, for whom the city state has become a location of choice for both their businesses and families”.
Further additions to the Japan desk in Singapore are planned “later in the year”, the bank said in a statement yesterday.
Reporting to Wolfgang Humbert-Droz, market head Japan, Mizuguchi will work with teams locally and regionally. The Japan desk in Singapore completes Julius Baer’s global setup for Japan, which includes existing desks in Zurich, Geneva and Hong Kong.
Separately, as of yesterday, the bank said Stefan Hofer had been appointed as head of business development of TFM Asset Management’s Tokyo office. He reports to Hirokazu Mikuniya, TFM’s representative in Japan.
The appointments are part of a drive by the Zurich-headquartered private bank to highlight how it sees Asia as its second home market. For example, last month it announced plans to issue perpetual tier one subordinated bonds in a benchmark-sized volume, to be listed on the Singapore Exchange.
Japan
TFM Asset Management is a Switzerland- and Japan-registered independent asset management company with offices in Tokyo and Zurich, in which Julius Baer has held a 60 per cent equity participation since 2013. The company holds investment management and investment advisory licences, both registered with the Japanese FSA, and concentrates predominantly on serving Japanese high net worth private clients.
To exploit Julius Baer’s strong brand for the group’s local business in Japan, there are plans to rename this operation TFM "Julius Baer Wealth Management", pending regulatory approvals.
“Our Japan business has experienced significant growth in recent years and continues to offer promising business opportunities. We therefore focus on adding talent to keep this positive momentum and expand our client coverage. Establishing a new Japan desk in Singapore was an important step in this regard, as the city is a major hub for our clientele,” Humbert-Droz said.
The move represents a return to Julius Baer for Hofer. He was chief investment advisor for Asia at BNP Paribas Wealth Management for one year. Previously, he had been emerging market strategist of Bank Julius Baer, responsible for the macroeconomic coverage of emerging markets from 2007 to 2014.