Yang, who is coming from Citi where he held a variety of senior roles since he joined the bank in 1990, will be in charge of ôdriving this new businessö for Merrill, insiders say. He will report to Damian Chunilal, who is head of Pacific Rim origination and is chief operating officer for the region, which at Merrill includes Japan, Australia and India, and everything in between.
Yang will work closely with Merrill's head of Asia origination, Sheldon Trainor, and with investment bankers and senior financial advisors across a variety of departments at Merrill trying to increase the revenues and seek opportunities for the new unit, which was launched in May. The group provides investment banking services to ultra high-net-worth individuals. So, for example, it might offer individual customers the same type of prime brokerage platform as it does to institutional investors.
ôThere are easy opportunities to increase the revenues by working across the banking teams,ö says a source. ôYang is coming in at a very senior position û there arenÆt that many managing directors with Pacific Rim titles at Merrill û and heÆs capable of seeking out those new opportunities.ö
Yang started out as a private banker for Citi and heÆs worked throughout the region building up a list of high-net-worth individualsÆ phone numbers stored in his Blackberry. He worked for CitiÆs private banking group in Hong Kong from 1996 to 2001, and then moved to Singapore where he managed its Singapore, Malaysia and Brunei private banking business. Next stop was Australia before moving to the US to work as the Manhattan region head.
Of his decision to move to Citi, an insider speculated that itÆs ônot often you get the chance to span two businessesö, a reference to MerrillÆs combining its private investment and banking groups.
Yang will work out of the Hong Kong office. HeÆs expected to begin with Merrill in September.
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