Societe Generale’s investment banking unit has appointed Stephane Loiseau as head of cash equities, Asia-Pacific, the French bank said in a statement yesterday.
It is a newly created position, and Loiseau will also retain his current role as deputy head of execution services, based in Hong Kong. He reports to François Banneville, global head of execution services and Peter McGahan, global head of cash equity sales and locally to Timothee Bousser, head of global equity flow, Asia-Pacific.
In addition, Loiseau joins the board of Ji Asia as a non-executive director. Societe Generale has a strategic partnership with Ji Asia the Pan Asian equity research and sales operation of Japaninvest Group in which Societe Generale holds a 24.99% stake.
The alliance was set up in 2010, and combined Ji Asia’s research teams based in Hong Kong and Tokyo with Societe Generale’s sales traders in Hong Kong, Tokyo, Seoul, Mumbai and London. Last year, Societe Generle hired several more sales traders across its Asian business despite the slowdown in global equities activity.
Nevertheless, Ashley Wilkins, deputy CEO of Societe Generale in Asia-Pacific told FinanceAsia last December that the bank had identified Asia as the region most likely to lead global economic growth, and so was continuing to build its businesses in Japan, Korea, Singapore and Malaysia.
Loiseau joined Societe Generale in 1996 as an international equities trader in New York. He later moved to the program trading team in London for three years where he helped to create a global execution platform. He then returned to New York in 2000 where he held several positions before becoming co-head of global program trading and electronic services in 2006.
Subsequently, Loiseau relocated to the UK to become deputy global head of execution services, and head of cash equity execution for London. He is a managing director and a member of the global equity flow executive committee.
In his new job, Loiseau will concentrate on developing Societe Generale’s cash equity franchise in the region, leveraging on the bank’s international trading platform and the analytical resources provided by Societe Generale Cross Asset Research and Ji Asia.
Loiseau “brings his long-standing experience in the cash equities business and in particular a strong understanding of institutional clients, which will prove very important as the group expands its cash equities offering”, said yesterday’s statement.
Societe Generale is one of Europe’s biggest financial services groups, and has a universal banking business model. The corporate and investment division employs nearly 12,000 professionals in 33 countries across Europe, the Americas and Asia-Pacific.
