Deutsche Bank strengthens Southeast Asia IB team

Phumchai Kambhato will jump ship to Deutsche Bank from UBS for a new dual role that will make him responsible for investment banking and corporate finance in Thailand, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.

Based in Bangkok, his official titles will be head of corporate banking and securities, as well as head of corporate finance, both for Thailand.

Kambhato has been with UBS for more than nine years, most recently as managing director and head of investment banking for Thailand. He joined the Swiss bank from Bualuang Securities, the investment banking subsidiary of Bangkok Bank, where he was head of investment banking.

Earlier in his career he also worked at J.P. Morgan in Bangkok, Singapore and London, and at Schroders in London.

This is the second senior Southeast Asia-focused investment banker to leave UBS in a matter of days after Evercore Partners announced late Sunday that it had hired Keith Magnus to set up its new office in Singapore. Magnus was head of investment banking for Singapore and Malaysia at UBS, a position that he had held since he joined the bank in mid-2009.

Speaking after Magnus’s resignation, a source said that UBS still has five or six bankers of managing director level in Singapore after moving people from other regions recently. In late June the bank also appointed Saurabh Beniwal to a new position as head of investment banking for Southeast Asia, excluding the Philippines, which means it has essentially already put someone in place to coordinate the coverage in the countries that have until now been headed by Magnus and Kambhato.

Beniwal is retaining his job as head of technology, media and telecoms (TMT) alongside his new position, but has relocated from Hong Kong to Singapore.

The source said UBS may aim to fill the vacated positions with one or two new hires, but there is no need to do so immediately, as it has enough people in the region to continue to operate efficiently.

UBS ranked first for equity capital markets transactions in Southeast Asia in the first half of this year and sixth for completed M&A deals, while Deutsche Bank was outside the top-10, Dealogic data show. In debt capital markets, the positions were reversed with Deutsche Bank ranked fourth and UBS outside the top-10.

Deutsche Bank has been making other hires in Southeast Asia to develop its corporate finance and coverage platforms in the region, though. As FinanceAsia has reported, the bank recently poached Boon Kee Tan from Goldman Sachs to be head of client coverage for Southeast Asia, and in May it hired Philip Lee from J.P. Morgan as chief country officer for Singapore and vice chairman for Southeast Asia.