Credit Suisse Group is restructuring its asset and wealth management business, including replacing the head of its asset management division, as the Swiss bank faces fallout from its financial entanglements with bankrupt Greensill Capital.
Credit Suisse on Thursday announced that Ulrich Körner, former chief executive officer of UBS Group’s asset management unit, will replace Eric Varvel as head of Credit Suisse Asset Management. In addition, the bank said that the asset management group would be separated from Credit Suisse’s international wealth management business and run as a separate division.
Körner, who worked for Credit Suisse for more than a decade before moving to UBS in 2009, will be the asset management CEO and serve as a member of the bank’s executive board. He will report directly to Credit Suisse’s chief executive Thomas Gottstein.
Varvel will remain in his other roles as U.S. CEO and chairman of the investment bank, Credit Suisse said.
The changes will take place starting April 1.
[II Deep Dive: Credit Suisse Takes Hit as York Capital Winds Down Funds]
Earlier this month, Credit Suisse announced that it would liquidate roughly $10 billion in funds tied to supply-chain finance programs managed by Greensill Capital. Greensill, a U.K. financial services company, filed for insolvency on March 8 and appointed administrators that same day.
In Credit Suisse’s annual report, also released Thursday, Gottstein and board chairman Urs Rohner said that the bank was working closely with Greensill Capital administrators and other parties to recover capital for investors in the supply-chain finance funds.
“Credit Suisse’s priority remains the recovery of funds for CSAM’s investors,” they wrote in the report. Gottstein and Rohner said that Credit Suisse has started making redemption payments totaling $3.1 billion and that the bank intends to announce further cash distributions over the coming months.
In a separate annual compensation report signed by Credit Suisse board member Kai Nargolwala, the bank said it has suspended bonus payments for “a number of senior employees” involved with the supply-chain finance funds, up to and including executive board members.
