Bank of America has made two high-profile changes in its investment bank, building on a successful strategy of elevating Australian bankers into broader regional roles this year.
Mr Warburton will report to BofA’s regional corporate and investment banking head, Peter Guenthardt, who is based in Hong Kong. Mr Kambe will report to Hong Kong-based Matthew Basler, BofA’s head global capital markets for APAC.Mr Warburton and Mr Kambe’s appointments follow the promotion of four Australian BofA managing directors in the last five months, who saw their roles enlarged to APAC status from local ones.
The promotions of Mr Karpes and Mr Hobby come approximately four months after Michael Evans joined Japan-based banker Tamao Sasada as BofA’s co-heads for Asian financial institutions, and Karl Rozman was asked to co-lead natural resources and energy transition for the region with Hong Kong-based Dan Yuan.
Mr Evans, the US bank’s co-head of APAC financial institutions who covers clients from India to Japan, said face-to-face meetings were critical. Natural resources head Mr Rozman added that the extra air miles were not much more than heading to Western Australia. “The co-head structure is beneficial in the sense it enables consistent focus across key regions – Australia, Japan, greater China, Singapore, Korea and South-East Asia,” he said.